Prodigy
by SkywardShadow
Summary: Drabbles focusing on every Wammy's Kid we know and love. And Roger. May contain AU, OCs, strange pairings, stranger theories and **SPOILERS**. -Complete-
1. Numbers

Disclaimer: I'm writing _fanfiction_, for crying out loud. You make the call. I also do not own any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble.

**Numbers**

**x-x**

"_Life is not measured by numbers." -?_

**x-x**

Numbers.

Everything in his life revolved around numbers.

Lifespans. Mathematical calculations. When you have the ability to see the date of death of everyone around you, and happen to be a genius besides, it's understandable that numbers would be a very large part of your life.

Perhaps it was the numbers that helped push him, slowly and subtly at first, then faster than a train speeding downhill with no brakes, to the edge.

The edge of sanity. The edge that he eventually fell over; fell so far so fast that he rapidly forgot what sanity used to mean to him. The word became nothing more than its dictionary definition.

But again, that is understandable. Anyone would be driven to that same edge, seeing death counted in simple numbers everywhere they turned. That may have been a factor. That..

And mirrors.

Oh, he _hated_ mirrors.

But there was no escape from them; from reflective surfaces in general.

No escape from numbers and knowledge.

Because he could not help it: whenever he passed any sort of reflective surface, his gaze wandered. His death-seeing eyes drifted upward in all too human curiosity. The morbid desire to attain information he truly did not want.

He would see the glowing numbers floating lazily over his own head.

Quickly. Slowly. Surely…

Counting down.

**x-x Fin**

**A/N: I am still trying to decide if that was actually good or just okay. Or if it stunk. Hope it wasn't that last option..**

**Reviews make me a very happy authoress! But feel no obligation. –SS**


	2. Meaningless

Disclaimer: I do not own Death Note, and would highly appreciate not being sued. Hn? I also do not own any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble.

**Meaningless**

**--o--**

"_There is no meaning to our world. There is no meaning to those of us living there. We meaningless beings ponder the world, though the realization of meaninglessness itself means nothing." –Tite Kubo_

**--o--**

A.

That was who he was.

A.

He had no name. Not really.

He had no individuality. Not where it counted.

None of the Wammy's Kids did in the end, as he mused. They were all the same. Young, intelligent orphans who strived to surpass L. An older boy who was, when you thought about it, just like them. Isolated and alone.

At least most of the other children had names. _Real_ names; not the cold and unyielding nicknames required by the House. They had their identities, which are priceless possessions to those who lack them.

A was just A. That was it. Empty and simple.

He was just like everybody else, without even a true name to distinguish himself from any other orphan.

The first letter of the alphabet. The first child after L to arrive at Wammy's House.

Number one in ways that did not matter.

Meaningless.

_And,_ he used to muse, _maybe this world would be better off..if the meaningless people like that-like __**me**__-did not exist anymore._

You could call it an experiment. An unfinished one: Would the world be better off without so-called 'meaningless' beings inhabiting it?

It was A's experiment. And he himself decided to test the theory.

**--oFin**

**A/N: Couldn't resist. A is just too fun. **

**I do the happy dance when someone reviews. But feel no obligation. –SS**


	3. Perception

Disclaimer: If I was Tsugumi Ohba, would I be writing this in English..? Um, no. I also do not own any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble.

**Perception**

**.X.**

"_I hate life, I hate death, and everything in between just doesn't interest me." –Chris Rapier_

**.X.**

Nobody knows whether or not he truly believed in God. 'The' God, 'a' god, or _any_ god, for that matter.

He probably didn't know where he stood on the matter himself. It didn't seem all that important to him.

The rosary had belonged to one of his parents. Maybe his mother was deeply religious; maybe his father was a priest. He doesn't know (nobody knows; how could they?), and it never really mattered to him.

Besides, the concept of "God" can be twisted in so many ways. (He himself ended up fighting a God that he perceived as false.) As a genius who was raised to see things in a logical way, Mihael Keehl may have preferred it when things had straightforward answers.

God was one giant question mark. He/She/It was also the question that preceded the question mark; one of the most puzzling questions in the world's history. A question without any real answer.

There was nothing straightforward about the whole thing, so perhaps he ignored it. Unanswerable questions may have been pointless to him.

Still, he wore that cross until the end of his life; whether it was out of sentimentality or real faith or something else altogether, nobody can know.

Perhaps he wondered, in his dying seconds, if there was a God.

Perhaps he wondered if He or She or It had left him behind to die.

But sadly, every question the world can have about the boy called Mello must be left up to everyone's own _perception_.

Because we do not and cannot know what his own perception was.

**.XFin**

**A/N: I can't help but wonder about that rosary. Maybe this drabble was born of the irritation that comes with knowing that I will never know. That's always gonna bug me. XD**


	4. Trivial

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note. I also do not own any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble.

**Trivial**

**x-x**

"_The supreme irony of life is that hardly anyone gets out of it alive." –Robert Heinlein_

**x-x**

_(L Lawliet – 75, 23, 1, 3, 6, 2)_

"_What is the point? What does any of it matter, really?"_

Back when he cared about such trivial things as the meaning of life and the worth of a human, B would ponder the question.

_(Mihael Keehl – 5, 0, 2, 2, 0, 9)_

Everyone around him he knew, first and foremost, as names and numbers.

The names were pointless. _Identities_ are made with or without names; there really was no reason to have a name in the first place.

But the numbers had meaning. In just a few numeric symbols, B could see a person's end. The numbers were important. They mattered. They were cold hard fact; they were a merciless dictator that could not be undermined.

_(Nate River – 4, 3, 4, 0, 6)_

What were people remembered as? Who were they remembered by? In most cases, only their family and close friends knew of their end and mourned. A select few found a way to cheat death, so to speak, and avoid being forgotten by doing something truly 'meaningful'.

But as for everyone else, they were nothing, when it came down to it. They were diary entries written in ink and left in the sun to slowly fade away. They were snowflakes, zooming unstoppably toward the ground and their end; but nobody notices one snowflake over another, really.

_(Mail Jeevas – 2, 3, 0, 8, 7, 6)_

What year he was born; what year she died; how many years he lived; remember that _time_ back in (_insert-date-here_)?

In the end, what _was_ a person, if not numbers and statistics?

_(Beyond Birthday – 8, 8, 2, 13, 5)_

What, indeed?

**x-Fin**

**A/N: Another B drabble…**

**All of the lifespans shown above (besides B's and Matt's) are true to the manga and anime (L's was a massive pain to get a hold of, but whatever).**

**Reviews are love. But as always, feel no obligation. **

**Shade and sweet water. –SS**


	5. Nothing

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note. I also do not own any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble.

**A/N: This one is dedicated to two people: Tails-Coyote-Carnivore, for being the first reviewer (yay!!); and Kanki Youji (you're going to get sick of me dedicating things to you..) for writing the review on another story that partly inspired this. Thank you both!**

**Nothing**

**o0o**

"_You don't want to reach for me, do you?_

_I mean nothing to you. _

_The little things give you away."_

**o0o**

"Just distract them. Whatever method works."

"..That'll have to be one hell of a distraction, Mello."

"Use the smokescreen, then."

"You sure that'll work?"

"Drive right through them if you have to," Mello growled in frustration. "Just get their attention. I don't _care_ how." And he left the room.

The redhead left behind sighed and collapsed into the couch.

"_I don't __**care **__how."_

_Great_, Matt thought, his mental voice dripping with sarcasm. _Nice to know I'm appreciated around here._

It wasn't like it was anything new. He hadn't really been expecting any show of gratitude when he agreed to help his friend; Mello just wasn't the kind of person to admit-in any way-that he needed someone else.

Matt had come to help Mello when the blond blew himself up, driving double the speed limit and breaking about fifty road laws in the process. He'd probably saved his friend's life, but he expected no thank-you, and didn't get one.

He agreed to stay and continue to assist Mello in his quest to find and destroy Kira. He'd pulled consecutive all-nighters more than once, hacking into places even he didn't know he could hack. If you racked up all of Matt's crimes that he committed in less than three months with Mello, it would probably be enough to send the redhead to prison for two lifetimes. But he didn't expect any thanks, and he didn't get any.

He took being ordered around in stride. He bore the brunt of his friend's frustrated displays of temper; kept quiet and didn't mention them again. Someone else might observe that he probably kept Mello _sane_. But he didn't ask for gratitude, and he received none.

None of that really bothered him. He didn't _let_ it bother him.

But this time, try as he might, he couldn't shake the sense of feeling jaded. He'd risked plenty before to help Mello, but this was different.

He could die. He could be killed _so easily_.

The fact didn't scare him, but it did bring to light an irritating thought: He was risking his _life_ to help Mello. And yet the blond acted like that risk meant nothing.

Once, just this _once_, some show of appreciation would be great. Gratitude for everything the gamer was risking, without asking anything in return.

_But…_

Matt stood and went to get the smokescreen, prep it for tomorrow. He knew he would continue to do whatever Mello asked of him, and there was no point in wondering why.

Or hoping for appreciation. Because as long as he didn't expect anything, he'd feel no disappointment when he received nothing.

**o0o**

"_All you've ever wanted was someone to truly look up to you._

_And six feet underwater,_

_I do." –Linkin Park_

**o0o**

**A/N: This is probably long enough to be a oneshot instead of a drabble..but oh well.**

"**The Little Things Give You Away" by Linkin Park is a beautiful song, and I think it really fits Matt. -SS**


	6. Amusement

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note. I also do not own any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble.

**A/N: This chapter is dedicated to Miko Akako (read her story 'Flashes of You'; it's great!); thanks so much for reviewing, Alerting and Favoriting!!**

**Amusement**

**-x-**

"_There's a vampire in the closet_

_Smiling at me_

_He weaves spells made of chocolate and coconut cream.." _

**-x-**

"Hey….Does that mean you can see _my_ death, too, Beyond?"

Ten-year-old Beyond glanced at his younger cousin with something like apprehension. "Yes it does, Harlequin. Beyond can see _everyone's_ death with these eyes. You're nothing special."

Harlequin Birthday deflated a bit at the last comment. "Mum made _sure_ I got thought 'special'," he mumbled. "With a name like 'Harlequin'…can't even get those creeps at school to call me Harly instead.."

Eyes downcast, he didn't see the-slippery, almost mischievous-smile slide across his cousin's bloodless face.

"Harlequin," he said silkily, "would you like to know your numbers?"

"Huh? What do you mean?"

"I mean," Beyond replied slowly, "would you like Beyond to tell you when you are going to die?"

A moment of silence.

"…For real?" Harlequin asked in disbelief. "You're serious?"

"_Dead_ serious," Beyond intoned, a statement at odds with the low-pitched giggle that escaped his lips a moment later. Harlequin bit down on his lower lip; he had not missed the emphasis on 'dead', and it made him nervous.

"I dunno, Beyond…I mean, knowing when you're gonna croak? I don't know if that's a good idea, you know?"

"Yes, Beyond does know," the older boy replied, with something remarkably like stiffness underlining his tone. Like steel bars running underneath a bridge, holding it up. "Beyond has known from the first time he looked in a mirror the exact date of his death. He could tell you precisely when to start planning his funeral, if he wanted to."

"..Wow," Harlequin breathed softly. "That must be tough." He started to reach over to pat his cousin's shoulder, but something made him think better of it. He opted instead for silent sympathy.

For a minute or so, Harlequin quietly sat and thought. _Beyond is so brave, walking around like nothing's wrong even though he knows when he's going to die. He's really strong. _

_Maybe if I knew my 'numbers', too, it would make him feel better..?_

"There are many benefits of knowing your deathday," Beyond spoke up, as if reading his cousin's mind. "You know exactly how much time you have, so you can plan everything out. You can plan your whole life out ahead of time." Like a salesman reading an advertisement. "It's almost like…having a _schedule_." He allowed a sly grin to surface. He knew how much the younger boy loved schedules.

Sure enough, Harlequin smiled, albeit shakily. "Y-Yeah. You know what, Beyond? I think I wanna know my numbers."

"Are you sure?" Beyond asked in silently mocking concern.

"Yeah."

"_Positive_?" Teasingly.

"Yes!" Harlequin, for all his doubts, was now caught up in the excitement-and naiveté-of youth.

"Alright then. Move a little closer." Said the spider to the fly, a fly so willingly caught in the spider's beautiful silken trap.

Harlequin hurried forward, sweating and smiling.

Beyond made a grand show of squinting above the boy's head, "Mm-hmm"ing and raising thin black eyebrows.

"Well?!" Harlequin exclaimed.

Beyond Birthday leaned forward, still grinning. Harlequin could feel his cousin's hot breath, making him shiver as the hairs on his neck stood up.

Beyond whispered a date in his cousin's ear.

Harlequin drew back abruptly. "What?! No! _No_!" His voice quickly reached a screaming pitch. "You're lying, Beyond, you're _lying_, you lousy jerk!" Tears filled his eyes, but he wiped them away quickly. "You-NO! It's NOT true! _LIAR_!"

He scrambled to his feet and ran to the door, though his pale hands were shaking so badly he could barely grasp the knob.

He managed to get the door open and ran for the stairs without noticing the sleeping cat right in his path.

Beyond watched expressionlessly as his cousin tripped over the family cat and went flying headfirst down _exactly_ twenty-five stairs. He listened interestedly to the symphony of thumps that cascaded down the steps, ending with a harsh and glorious _thud_ as the final note.

His mother and aunt, who had been chatting in the kitchen; he heard their quick, panicked footsteps racing for the staircase. He heard his mother's soft, choked "Dear merciful God." He heard his aunt's unearthly screams. He knew tears would soon follow.

Beyond crept to the top of the stairs and looked down at the black-haired boy, his usually neat clothing wrinkled, his body twisted in the most fascinating ways, his gray eyes blank and unseeing.

A smile wormed its way over Beyond's features once more.

"Beyond told you so," he said, and giggled.

**-x-**

"_I've been living in a mortuary_

_My whole life long." -Alu_

**-x-**

**A/N: Yet another Beyond drabble. Are you getting sick of him yet? XD Seriously, though, I'll try to focus more on other Wammy's Kids. –sweatdrop-**

**I don't write "dark" stuff like this all that often; how was it? Reviews are the highlight of my day, but as always, feel no obligation. **

**Shade and sweet water. –SS**


	7. Mellow

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note. I also do not own any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble.

**A/N: First off, thanks very much to Mickee for your review, and heitone for reviewing, Alerting and Favoriting! Arigato!**

**Second, it has been brought to my attention that..well, I screwed up. Beyond Birthday cannot see his own numbers, which I forgot somehow. Sorry about that!**

**Intro.1: Mellow**

**:0:**

"_Have you ever seen a day that turns into night?_

_Have you ever been wrong when you thought you were right?_

_Has it ever been said you're a jolly good fellow?_

_Whoa-oh, have you ever been Mellow?" -Spacekatz_

**:0:**

"Hi! You must be new here, right?"

Nine-year-old Mihael-_no, no, that's not right; it's Mello now, I'm not Mihael anymore_-scowled and muttered something pretty much unintelligible, except for the words 'Captain Obvious'. The blonde girl in front of him seemed not to notice.

"I'm Linda," she continued, presenting her alias without any change of tone or expression. Like giving up her identity didn't bother her in the slightest. Like 'Linda' was her _real_ name, instead of just a way to hide (although from what, he was still trying to figure out). "Art's my specialty. What's yours?"

He hadn't even opened his mouth yet when she answered herself with a sheepish grin. "Oh, right, you wouldn't know, since you just got here. Sorry about that."

_..This girl talks too much._ He hoped his patented Death Glare would get rid of her, but no such luck. She just gave him a sympathetic smile, as if remembering her own first days at Wammy's House.

"I've decided to be your guide," she ploughed on, blissfully unaware that the boy in front of her was quickly losing whatever he possessed that resembled patience. "Heck knows it can get confusing around here! So come on; I'll tell you about some of the other kids." And she started walking away, apparently under the impression that he would follow like an obedient puppy.

"…" It occurred to him that he _would_ have to follow her. He'd just gotten here, he had no idea where anything was or what he was supposed to be doing. It was either follow the-_obnoxious, overly talkative, cocky, way too friendly_-blonde girl, or risk looking like an idiot by wandering around aimlessly.

He groaned and hurried after her.

She pointed out other children at random: Tara-Annh, a glasses-wearing brunette toting around a tarantula in a cage; Gelbert, who appeared to be sleeping with open eyes; Miso, who rocked back and forth in a corner of the floor, giggling at some phantom joke; Matt, whose eyes were glued to a handheld video game.

Mello managed to take all this weirdness in stride, despite the nagging feeling that he had been sent to a psyche ward by mistake.

And then he saw-_him_.

That cool-_no, not cool, because cool is like cold and there's no way that skin has any sort of temperature, hot __**or**__ cold_-blank, emotionless face. Calm, expressionless; calculating like a computerized robot, analyzing like the genius he was.

All plain white-_not pure, because isn't he anything but?_-as opposed to Mello, who dressed himself in all black, because wasn't that somewhat appropriate for a boy still quietly grieving for his family?

White pajamas, like a sleepwalker or someone who simply didn't want to wake up; white hair being incessantly twisted, and piercing gray eyes.

Mello disliked him instantly.

"Oh, that's Near. He's the top of every class; has been ever since he got here. Everyone says he's a shoe-in for L's successor," Linda informed him matter-of-factly.

"…Successor to _L_? _That_ little twerp?!"

"Don't call him a twerp. It's rude."

"Don't tell me what to do."

"Don't make it _necessary_ for me to tell you what to do."

"Don't-" _wait, __**what**__?_

Linda shot him something like a smirk. "Work on your repartee, or you won't last here. Good luck, Mellow Yellow."

"Mello _what_?!"

"You heard me-Mellow Yellow. It's a song. And your new name."

"You can't call me that!"

"You can't tell me what to do."

"…You annoying-!"

"You're just lucky it wasn't 'Melon'."

Linda hid a smile as his squawks of protest continued.

She was going to have far too much fun with this particular newbie…

**:0Fin**

**A/N: It kind of went all over the place, but I like this one. I enjoy the idea of Linda baiting Mello like that. XD**


	8. Nightmare

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note. I also do not own any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. Or Gameboy.

**A/N: Inspired by a terrific piece of fanart on DA. **

**Thanks DeathMax-kun for proofreading.**

**The line-spacer thingy is a frog, incidentally.**

**Nightmare**

**.:-:.**

"_There is a fine line between genius and insanity. I have erased this line." –Oscar Levant_

**.:-:.**

All in all, Matt considered himself a person of average bravery. He wasn't a coward; he didn't shrink from danger, he was simply too apathetic to really care most of the time. Maybe that could be called recklessness.

**Beep beep beep**_ [X X double-O square square almost there]_

He would drive toward a blown-up building and dig through ridiculous amounts of burning debris to find a friend. No problem.

**Beep beep beep**_ [gotta use speed boost here use triangle key too]_

He would deliberately prod Mello until the blond exploded, merely for entertainment when things got too monotonous; although he wasn't sure if that fell under the heading of 'bravery' or 'stupidity'. Either way, he had no trouble doing it.

**Beepbeepbeep**_ [use the Flame Sword on Henchman 2 because he's the Boss's biggest weakness]_

He wasn't and had never been afraid of spiders, snakes, heights, clowns, ducks, bullies, kidnappers, strangers, crowds, closed-in spaces, elevators, knees, toes, feet, platinum blonde hair or anything else of the sorts. He could handle those things; he wasn't afraid of any of them.

**Beepbeepbeepbeep**_ [keep using the Sword add a triple-kick combo XO double-triangle square ALMOST THERE]_

"MATT! Shut that stupid game the hell UP! I'm trying to get some friggin' sleep in here!"

He could ignore it when Mello was ready and willing to strangle him. The blond could have steam pouring out of his ears and nostrils, and Matt would remain perfectly calm.

His leather-clad, mafia-joining, won't-hesitate-to-point-a-gun-at-your-head-if-you-disturb-his-rest best friend didn't scare him in the slightest.

**Beepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeep** _[XXX quadruple-punch special combo I'm almost there square square just keep it up almost have the Boss]_

But there was one thing in this world that truly scared the gamer. His own personal nightmare.

**BEEPBEEPBEEPBEEPBEEPBEEPBEEPBEEP** _[almost-wait a second why is my Gameboy making that noise and-smoking?!]_

"_**MATT**_!"

Lucky for Mello's sanity and Matt's still-in-one-piece-ness, the beeping abruptly ceased.

With one last feeble little attempt to remain alive, the Gameboy let loose one more puff of smoke and died, leaving the redhead to stare in horror at a black screen that had almost had his highest score written across it.

"…"

Unfortunately for Matt, his nightmare had come true.

The banging of a goggle-wearing head into the table was noisy enough to prompt Mello out of bed. With his precious-and loaded-gun.

The scene that followed would inspire an entirely new set of nightmares for the gamer for a very long time.

**.:-Fin**

**A/N: Okay, so I have way too much fun with these. –grin-**


	9. Reason

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note. I also do not own any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble.

**Reason**

**-1.26.2010-**

"_Human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe." –H.G. Wells_

**-1.26.2010-**

Some people wondered why Mello hated Near.

Others accepted it as merely a law of nature and didn't attempt to change or understand it. But some did wonder.

Most of the wonderers narrowed the reason down to, "Well, Near is always ahead of Mello. Of course there'd be resentment." And left it at that. Anyone who looked deeper could only find faint possibilities and half-reasons; nothing they could truly justify or explain.

Near understood. He understood perfectly why he was despised by his blond opposite.

There was, of course, the surface reason. Mello wanted to be number one, but he could never beat Near. He was stuck in a seemingly eternal second place, and that naturally created resentment.

Looking a little deeper. Near didn't seem to care that he was number one. His total lack of emotion and expression gave the impression that he didn't care. Some might think that he found staying at the top easy (which he did, but that wasn't relevant, really).

In other words, Mello's hardest work, his best attempts, could never come close to what Near accomplished without even exerting himself. And Near occupied a place that Mello would kill to have, yet the younger boy couldn't seem to care less.

Looking still deeper. And further back-to their first meeting. Mello had come to Wammy's House a young and confused boy, trying to seem strong. But he had just lost his parents and siblings, and couldn't help grieving; no one could blame him for that.

And then there was Near, quiet and calm, playing apathetically with his childish toys. Obviously he, too was an orphan, but while Mello struggled constantly to keep a relaxed façade and not get depressed at thoughts of his dead family, Near-who was even younger than he was-remained emotionless and collected.

It was almost like Near was mocking the blond.

_I can lose everything and still go on without breaking down. Can you?_

It had long been said that Mello was extremely intelligent, but that he let his emotions undermine his potential. Near didn't appear to have any problem suppressing his emotions-if he had any. That probably irked Mello as well.

The blond suffered because of the ties with his family that he had lost. Near did not. (Which must have been infuriating.)

Mello broke every rule in the book in his quest to capture Kira. He was more determined than ever before to beat his rival (or at least who he considered a rival, because Near calmly assessed that Mello was not in his league). He threw away his morals, his conscience, and his life.

And even that was not enough.

_Yes,_ the white-haired boy mused in the silent aftermath of their war. _If I were him, I believe I would hate me too._

But hatred does not matter, because he has solved the puzzle. He has won.

He is not a loser.

Unlike the young man who gave everything he had and still could not succeed.

**-Fin**


	10. Necessary

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note, or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble.

**A/N: Another one inspired by fanart. DeviantArt members, you guys rock. **

**This one can probably be classified as crack, incidentally. **

**Necessary **

**^0^**

"_Give me the chocolate, and nobody gets hurt." -?_

**^0^**

"The Easter Egg Hunt is for the _little_ kids," Matt pointed out dryly. "So why-"

"Because logic will not affect Mello in any way. Not in this particular situation," Near replied in a remarkably calm tone, considering the yells that were coming from the room next door.

The gamer sighed. "Must we do this _every single year_?" he inquired, trying to hold back his exasperation. "I mean, I know he gets a little crazy about today, but-"

The white-haired seven-year-old cut him off again. "'A little crazy' is an understatement. Mello's chocolate addiction has become hazardous to his own health, and the health of the children who participate in the egg hunt. Do you recall what happened last year, when we let him loose?"

"I prefer not to," Matt replied with a shudder.

"Then I've made my point."

The redhead sighed again; he really didn't feel like spending the day listening to his friend yelling and demanding to be released _all day long_. Not to mention the beating he was sure to receive from said friend the next day for his role in the whole thing.

"Look, Near, that was a year ago," he pleaded. "Is this really necessary?"

"…Do you _hear_ him screaming in there?" Near responded with uncharacteristic apprehension written on his face. "If we were to let him out now.." He didn't need to complete the sentence. Both boys shivered.

"All right, I get it. Remind me…what precautions did you add this year, exactly?"

Something like the hint of a smirk twitched at the corner of Near's mouth. "Well, there was the usual-ropes, a blindfold, a gag; all of which you helped me with, naturally-but I also locked the door, took the key and propped a chair under the doorknob." He paused, looking thoughtful. "And I shoved him under the bed for good measure," he added finally.

"…Remind me never to get on your bad side."

"Fair enough."

"You realize Mello is going to murder both of us when he gets out of there?"

"If. _If_ he gets out of there. I have the key, after all."

Matt took a glance at the more-than-a-little-bit creepy smile sliding across Near's face.

He slid back a few inches.

**^0Fin**

**A/N: Told ya it was crack. Happy Easter. XD**


	11. Try

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note, or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble.

**A/N: Thanks loads to Arnold the Pygmy Puff (love that pen name XD) for reviewing and Alerting; also to Tails-Coyote-Carnivore and flamesplz for reviewing!!**

**WARNING: AU time! This plotline here is unlikely/impossible, so read with an open mind, please.**

**Try**

**7i7**

"_For us, there is only trying. The rest is not our business." –T.S. Eliot_

**7i7**

"But.."

The young teen sighed. "What is it _now_, Andrew?"

"It's just…" Nine-year-old Andrew focused on his shoes rather than meet L's intense gaze. "The..the point of this is so you'll have a backup to carry on the name of L, right?"

"Yes," L replied impatiently. "As I've already explained four times." His words came out sounding unnecessarily harsh; but after all, he was a thirteen-year-old boy who hadn't slept in the better part of a week. He was in no mood to repeat himself-_again_.

Andrew succeeded in his attempt not to flinch. "Well, that's the thing..if you're gonna have me trained as your backup, then that means you…well, you think…um.."

L closed his eyes; obviously his prayers for patience were being ignored. "Formulate the thought, Andrew."

Andrew nodded hurriedly, blushing in embarrassment. "What I mean is, if you need a backup, then you must think that you're going…going to _die_." He ended the sentence in a voice no louder than a whisper.

The older boy's eyes slowly opened. "Yes, Andrew. Everybody dies, and as a professional detective, there's an eighty-five percent probability that I will die sooner than the average man. It's a fact. I will die someday, and then it will be up to you to continue my work."

Andrew winced. "I just..I just don't know if I can do it!" he yelped. "You're _L_, for heaven's sake! I mean, you're a genius! You've always been the best at _everything_! How can I possibly live up to that?!"

L blinked a few times, surprised at the sudden outburst. "…You are extremely intelligent also, Andrew," he said quietly, kneeling down to meet the smaller boy's frightened eyes. "And very resourceful. You will be the best possible successor to L."

Nervously, Andrew looked up to meet L's dark stare. "But..what if I'm not good _enough_?" he whispered.

L paused, then gave an odd, small smile. He ruffled Andrew's hair. "I can't promise anything," he said. "But all you can do is try. All you _have_ to do is try. Everyone will be proud of your efforts, even if you don't execute everything perfectly."

Andrew's shaky smile showed at least a hint of new confidence. L straightened up-as much as he ever did, anyway-and added, "Don't forget, I can't call you 'Andrew' anymore. From now on, for your own safety, it's-"

"I know," Andrew interrupted. "A. I'm A."

"That's right. Now go ahead to the kitchen; I think Quil-I mean Watari-is almost done making lunch."

A nodded and headed for the door. Right before leaving, he turned and grinned at L.

"Thanks, big brother."

L smiled and watched him leave.

**7Fin**

**A/N: I wanted to write an L drabble (finally..), I wanted to write another A drabble, and this was the result. x)**


	12. Intro 1: Mail

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note, or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble.

**A/N: Domo arigato to Arnold the Pygmy Puff and Ghostly Priestess Kikyo for reviewing; also to mangaluver34 for reviewing, Alerting and Favoriting!! **

**RCS stands for Really Creative Spacer. XD**

**Intro.2: Mail**

**^RCS^**

"_Life is just one damned thing after another." –Elbert Hubbard_

**^RCS^**

A red-haired eight-year-old walked around the neighborhood, hating his name.

Well, maybe 'hate' isn't the right word. More like 'loathed'; perhaps with a few colorful phrases added on, such as 'with a fiery passion'.

Yes, Mail Jeevas decided, that sounded right. He loathed his name with a fiery passion.

He wasn't sure who was to blame for it. Had some higher power been having a bad day when he was born, and decided to vent its frustration on a newborn boy? Or were his parents simply stupid?

He winced at the thought and mentally slapped himself. It always felt wrong to criticize or insult his parents (even though most of his school friends did so all the time), especially since only one of them was alive at the moment.

But still, it irked him to no end that his mom and dad had settled on the name _Mail_ for their only son. _Mail_.

It didn't matter how many times he explained to the other kids that it was just spelled weird, that it was actually pronounced 'Mile' (which was odd in itself, but in this case it was the lesser of two evils). They still laughed and teased; even teachers looked like they had to bite back smiles. He wished his schoolmates would at least be _creative_ with their hazing-mailman jokes had long since gotten old, but apparently nobody else was tired of them.

"Hello."

Mail jumped. He hadn't even noticed the person who had started walking beside him. Instinct told him to panic, but the new person, upon closer inspection, turned out to be a tall, lanky young man. Or maybe 'man' wasn't right; he could very well have been a teenager. Messy black hair had been jammed uncaringly into a hat; the same could be said for a pair of sockless feet stuffed into untied sneakers. The man looked like he hadn't eaten in the better part of a year, and if his posture got any worse, he would probably just fall forward.

"Hi," he replied uncertainly. _Who the heck is this guy?_

"You are Mail, correct?"

Mail got over the initial shock of having someone actually pronounce his name right-and not make fun of it besides-and frowned. "Why do you want to know?"

A shadow crossed the young man's face, but it disappeared quickly. "You used t-you live with your father, am I right?"

Mail didn't notice the man's slip of the tongue, or its smooth cover. "Yeah," he answered, suspicious of the unsubtle subject change. "Ever since Mom died. Car accident." Why was he saying this to a stranger? His mouth snapped shut.

"Yes," the stranger said softly. "That is a hard thing to go through." He blinked out of an apparent reverie and focused on the boy again. "Did-does your father smoke, Mail?"

A more noticeable slip this time. _'Did'? What does he mean, 'did'?_ "Uh-yeah, he does. But why do _you_ care?!" he exclaimed, eyes suddenly blazing. "It's none of your business!"

"…"

"Anyway," Mail growled, partly angry at himself for telling a stranger so much. "I'm going home now. And if you follow me," he added for good measure, "I'll call the cops." And he scampered off as fast as he could.

The young man watched his retreating back with a sad look on his face.

_I bought you as much time as I could_, he thought. _Now.._

**^RCS^**

Young Mail Jeevas arrived home to a smoking ruin that used to be his house. Flames had only just released the wooden ranch when he stopped short. A body covered in a white sheet lay nearby, and he didn't need to ask any questions to know who it was.

The boy sank to his knees and froze there, in an unhearing daze, as firefighters and medics and police questioned him and made sympathetic comments. He listened, shocked, as they pretended to understand, and he tried not to scream because he didn't want to believe.

He registered the appearance of the slouching young man-albeit barely-and he felt himself being guided into a black car with the young man and a much older man. They said nothing, and he was glad of it.

He could not believe what had just happened.

He could not believe that less than an hour ago, he'd been griping about nothing more than a name.

**^Fin^**


	13. Newbie

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. You don't sue, I don't sic my flying monkeys on you. 

**A/N: Thanks very much to Tails-Coyote-Carnivore and mangaluver34 for reviewing!!**

**Oh yeah-this is AU. Although you probably would've figured that out yourself. XD Hope you enjoy.**

**Newbie**

**..L..**

"_The Bible tells us to love our neighbors, and also to love our enemies; probably because they are generally the same people." –G.K. Chesterton_

**..L..**

"Quit moving already, Mello!"

"Well, I'm bored, Matt! Sue me for being a little restless when we've been sitting here for almost ten minutes straight!"

"Ten minutes isn't really that long.."

"Shove it, Near!"

Linda sighed. "Will you guys knock it off! I'm almost done penciling; then you guys can go do whatever while I start the painting. Just sit tight for a little while longer."

"Whatever, Lin. Just hurry it up before Mello kills Near."

The three boys continued to hold their poses. Matt had attempted to plaster a smile on his face in the beginning, but after the first five minutes had given up. Mello had made it perfectly clear that he would _not_ smile for Linda's portrait, and she could expect to be chewed out if she asked. Near..well, nobody bothered to try and get _him_ to smile.

Just as the blonde girl was putting the finishing touches on Matt's goggles and Near's Transformer toy, a chestnut-haired older boy entered the room with his usual tired smile. "Hello; Linda, Matt, Mello, Near." The kids nodded in response. "Hey, A," Linda greeted him.

A glanced at Linda's unpainted drawing. "I don't suppose you could fit one more person in there, could you, Linda?"

Linda raised her eyebrows in confusion and gave the drawing another look. "Um..I guess I could probably squeeze somebody else in. Why?"

A made a gesture, and another boy entered the room, looking apprehensive. This boy looked only a little older than Mello. He had brown hair and eyes, and a calculating expression beneath a layer of nervousness. His eyes were red, probably from crying, Linda observed with sympathy. "New arrival?" she guessed.

A nodded and put a hand on the boy's shoulder. "L picked him up himself," he said. "This is the newest addition to Wammy's House."

The boy managed a smile as A introduced him.

"Guys, meet Light Yagami."

**..Fin..**

**A/N: -shrugs- Dunno what plot bunny bit me..well, if Light's parents had died when he was just a kid, who knows? And he would have been only about two years older than Mello..**


	14. Beautiful

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. You don't sue, I don't sic my flying monkeys on you. 

**A/N: Thank you the High Lady Solaris for reviewing and Alerting! Also WWDT for Alerting and Noxjana for reviewing, Alerting and Favoriting!!**

**I'm extremely sorry about the sporadic updating, but, well..you can't force inspiration, ya know? The Naruto fandom plot bunnies have been devouring my brain as of late, but I'm trying to coax the DN ones back out. xD**

**Warning: ****Shonen-ai. Nothing physical, just mentioned feelings. Don't like, don't read. Thank you, and please enjoy. ^.^**

**Beautiful**

**-~-**

"_I like a woman with a head on her shoulders. I hate necks." –Steve Martin_

**-~-**

He watches _that person_.

Constantly, day after day, he watches.

But he's smart about it. _(Not a genius for nothing.)_ He is inconspicuous. He is quiet. He leers only if there is nobody else around to see. He hides. He sneaks.

And from whatever hiding place he chooses, he continues to watch.

Stare, unblinkingly and without shame.

It isn't love. It passed that point quite a while ago. (He knows that. In fact, he may not have called it 'love' in the first place.) What it is..is more like obsession.

_That person_ could be called pretty. Chestnut hair; thin, but it frames well a pale face with delicate features. Dark brown eyes, like pools of some liquid. A forever gloomy expression always hiding beneath the omnipresent, though tired-looking, smile.

Below all of that, however-underneath the masks and the lies, the glumness and the false smiles-lies a much more enticing emotion. The most tantalizing one of all.

Fear.

Oh, yes. Fear.

The fear that glimmers in that person's eyes whenever that person catches him staring.

It is times like those when he finds that person more than merely 'pretty'. When fear slips across that thin face, he finds that person irresistibly beautiful.

He lets his imagination take things a step further..What would the object of his unabashed staring look like, wearing an expression contorted with _terror_?

He can barely control his excitement at the thought.

_Someday, someday,_ he thinks as he watches _that person_. Someday he will see the terror in that person's eyes. And he will enjoy it immensely.

But for now, he can content himself with staring. Black eyes boring metaphorical holes into the pale person.

_(A person who has just looked up, catching hungry eyes.)_

He sees the brunet swallow his nervousness. "Is there something I can help you with, Beyond?" the person inquires, a slight tremble in his voice.

Beyond smiles. "Not at the moment, A. Not at the moment."

**-~Fin**

**A/N: Hoo. Creepy. Stalker!Beyond is more fun to write than I thought.**

**Hope you enjoyed. Reviews are love, but feel no obligation.**


	15. Alias

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. You don't sue, I don't sic my flying monkeys on you. 

**A/N: Thanks smexychocoholic and MentalInstability for Favoriting. Also thank you padsy and the High Lady Solaris for reviewing. I appreciate it. ^_^**

**Alias**

**XxX**

Aliases. Nicknames. Fake names.

Whatever you wanted to call them, they all basically meant the same thing. And every person who had ever called Wammy's House 'home', even for a short while, had had one.

It was deemed strictly necessary by the management, particularly Quillish Wammy himself, who changed his own name to set an example.

Watari. 'Handler.' He helped L when the famed genius was only a scared child, and when the child grew up and silently claimed he no longer needed comfort, Watari switched to the role of assistant. So it made sense.

The aliases were established to protect the children's identity, of course. But there was another, underlying, reason: by taking another name, they were distancing themselves from their old lives and families. Leaving behind the name of a mother or father was a step down the path to leaving behind the namesakes themselves. Eventually, many of the children would forget their old names entirely; even lose the memory of their own loved one's faces.

Some would call it cruel. Quillish Wammy called it mercy.

The first Wammy's Kids-most notably A, B, and of course L-had simple aliases, given hurriedly and without much thought. The children could fit their new names with whatever deep meaning they cared to imagine.

A. 'Alternate.' The first letter of the alphabet. The first child in line to succeed L.

B. 'Backup.' An eternal second place which was understandably frustrating to a jaded young genius. The fact that it also happened to be both his initials was a coincidence he ignored.

L. L Lawliet, as the first child at Wammy's House, set the mold that almost every child who came after him would break. He used his own true name, displaying his intelligence yet again; once he became a famous detective, everyone would anticipate that he would use a false name. So he would use one so blatantly and obviously fake that nobody would give it a second thought. Except that the name 'L' _wasn't_ fake, and therein lay the genius. He could place his identity right under the noses of everyone in the world, and they would have no idea.

A few generations of prodigious children passed. Perhaps the most prolific to date included children bearing nicknames like 'Near', 'Matt', 'Mello', 'Linda'..a veritable smorgasbord.

'Near'. There was plenty of speculation concerning the origins of the white-haired boy's alias, one of the most plausible being that he was very 'near' L; very close to being his successor. Whereas anyone who had known the boy when he first arrived knew he was lonely and thought that maybe he had taken bits of his real name as an enduring connection to the life he lost.

'Mello'. That nickname got a laugh out of anyone who personally knew the boy in question. Aforementioned boy was anything _but_ 'mellow', so to what on earth was his alias testifying? The fact that it wasn't spelled "properly" only added to the confusion. The nickname was discussed often by his curious classmates, with the only halfway believable suggestions being that it was a family name or some word in his mother tongue. Although nobody knew what _that_ was, either.

'Matt'. The false name was unassuming and inconspicuous, much like its bearer, and nobody really gave it much thought because no one really gave the boy _himself_ much thought. He was Number Three, sure, but despite that, he was nothing outwardly "special". He had no character or personality as far as anyone knew, he never spoke; he was always holed up playing some video game and smoking. The other nickname he became known by was "Mello's friend", and _that_ alias got discussed a lot more than his true one.

'Linda'. Such a simple, normal-sounding name. Nobody knew whether she had come by it randomly or just thought it a pretty name, and to be honest, no one besides her circle of friends could care any less. Somewhere along the way, questioning someone over their alias became akin to asking an inmate what he had been imprisoned for; no one wanted to pry open old wounds, pick at scabs that may have been only just healing. So nobody inquired about the chosen alias 'Linda', and although she herself never forgot, Linda didn't bring it up.

The children and staff of Wammy's House made one unspoken promise when they arrived, and that was to keep their identities a strictly guarded secret. Trading true names could only lead to hurt, especially for more emotionally fragile children like A.

Thus, speculation was as close to an answer as any child ever got concerning another child's choice of name. It was a very personal thing, when you thought about it, and prodding could very well lead to disaster.

So they wondered. And if those in question knew the types of conclusions some classmates were jumping to, they might have laughed.

Because for most of them, no imagined theory ever came close to the truth.

**xXOwari**

**A/N: Hn. I seem to have fun running in metaphorical/hypothetical/theoretical circles.**


	16. Friends

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. You don't sue, I don't sic my flying monkeys on you. 

**A/N: Much thanks to Thepuppiesarecute for Favoriting, Alerting and reviewing. Arigato gozaimasu!**

**Friends**

**u-u**

"_We can draw lessons from the past, but we cannot live in it." –Lyndon B. Johnson_

**u-u**

L had never had much luck when it came to friends.

When he was at Wammy's House, for the first nine months or so, he had been pretty much alone. Watari had taught his classes, and there had been no other orphans there at the time. Watari had been _something_ like a friend, he supposed; but more of a caretaker, or perhaps even a parental figure.

A had joined the orphanage a bit before the establishment's one-year anniversary. A pale, thin, timid child, A was the sort of person who didn't open up to others easily. He always strived to please, which made him a favorite with the newly hired professors, but he was still a difficult boy to get close to. The enduring trauma left from the event that stole away his family did not help matters at all.

Despite both boys' social ineptitude, they became friends. Awkward, strange friends, but still. It counted for something.

Less than six months after A's arrival, B exploded onto the scene. He was a very different person from his two quiet, reserved classmates; he was talkative and smooth, and somewhat oily, like a snake. Their downcast gazes and unmoving mouths interested him, as his easily made (though often one-sided) conversation and wide, unnatural smiles interested them.

So, somewhere along the way, B fell into the 'friend' category. The trio of isolated geniuses bonded out of equal parts need and fascination, and had they stuck together, had they always stayed as close as they became, had the rivalries and pressures of their positions not strained their desperately needed bond, they might have become the ultimate crime-fighting detective group.

As it was, things spiraled far beyond their control; things crashed and slowly burned, beginning with the suicidal death of A.

If anyone had expected it, seen any signs, they never said. A had always been fragile, delicate even; and while L and B had enough willpower and mental strength to cope with the pressure of becoming 'number one', A had never been so strong. The House and the name of L demanded more than he could possibly give, and eventually shattered him beyond any kind of repair.

B's mental health began to deteriorate. L withdrew into himself even more than he had before. The trio was suddenly a duo, and one that was already splitting apart.

B and L had never really _clicked_. They had gotten along, more or less, but B was always fixated on surpassing L, and the resulting rivalry was too much strain for an already stretched friendship. Soft-spoken A had always been the bridge between the two, the quiet voice of reason that kept them from arguing. A had been the one thing they really had in common.

With A gone, a potential partnership rapidly dissolved into heated flames.

B left Wammy's House when he felt they could teach him no more. He vanished without a single word to L or anyone else. The next time the two would have any kind of contact would be when the famous detective L attempted to capture the infamous and brutal serial killer known to precious few as Beyond Birthday.

B died a few years later. Only two people attended the funeral.

L had nothing to even slightly resemble the bond he had shared with B and A-his doomed best friends-for a very long time. Until he met the intelligent Japanese college student Light Yagami.

Light was open but serious, extremely smart despite his age. He carried on actual conversations with L, became the older man's friend.

He also happened to be L's prime suspect in the monumental Kira Case.

But eventual evidence forced L to admit that Light was _not_ Kira, and some small part of the detective breathed a sigh of relief, despite the lingering doubts in the back of his mind.

Time passed; L's work on the case appeared to progress, with Light's help.

And then L died.

Watari was killed first, and then it hit L. A heart attack, Kira's preferred method of murder, ended his life as it had ended the lives of so many others. As it had ended the life of B.

L landed in Light's arms instead of on the floor. He forced himself to look up; forced himself to see the truth he already knew.

With dying eyes he saw Light's smirking face and knew that the first person he had considered a friend in _so long_ was a mass-murderer. _His_ murderer.

It was a given that the position at the top would be lonely. Still, L thought, he would have liked to know a friendship that was not false or strained.

But it was, evidently, not meant to be.

**u-Fin**


	17. Progression

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. You don't sue, I don't sic my flying monkeys on you. 

**A/N: TYVM to mangaluver34 and CeruleanCypher for reviewing, and NathalieSUN and WWDT for Favoriting! Also to Crimson Angel Winges for Alerting and Favoriting, and Rizera for Alerting, Favoriting and reviewing! Domo arigato!!**

**..x''**

_Oh, I've been travelin' on this road too long. _

_Just tryin' to find my way back home._

**..x''**

Everyone in his hometown always said that Mihael Keehl was a happy child.

Not just 'happy'. Maybe 'happy' was too simple a term for a very complex boy. Other adjectives were often used-words like 'vivacious', 'energetic', 'intelligent', and on more than one occasion, 'bratty'.

The boy was spirited, people said. A little outspoken, perhaps, but generally cheerful. His energy was infectious and boundless. He made friends easily, and few were stupid enough to make him into an enemy. He had a surprising level of intelligence-far higher than that of any of the other children, higher than even that of some adults. His parents couldn't have been prouder.

That was then. That was long ago.

Everyone at Wammy's House always said that Mello was an angry child.

Plenty of the children were, when they first arrived; after all, most new arrivals had just lost everything. They needed to lash out. The caretakers understood that. The fury melted away with time and care. But not Mello's. Mello's anger hung around like a bad cold that just refused to go away. It laughed at the test of time. It sneered at the offered care.

But he wasn't just 'angry'. Perhaps 'angry' was too simple a term for such a multifaceted boy. Other adjectives were often applied-words like 'fiery', 'confident', 'blazing', and on multiple occasions, 'nasty'.

The boy was emotional, people said. Maybe he had a good heart, but rarely did anyone see it. He shut people out, except for one persistent Matt. He laughed at the idea of having friends, excluding the single aforementioned exception. He made enemies with ease. His intelligence level was above average, even for the House-but he wasn't number one. He was never number one. The House workers couldn't have been more exasperated.

That was more recently. Not too long ago.

There were very few people at the funeral. One who did attend-maybe the only living person left who had a clue about the blond fireball-said (to himself) that Mello was an interesting person.

'Interesting' didn't quite cover it. 'Unpredictable', perhaps. 'Defiant'. 'Brave'. And on most occasions, 'reckless'.

Mello was different, the boy noted silently. He was wild. He was edgy. He was probably just a bit insane.

He played by no one's rules but his own. He sacrificed everything except for his emotion-his _humanity_-to reach his goal. He lived and breathed the opposition of a dictator, he fought hard, he smirked, he chose, he fell, he got back up, he burned.

He was an adversary of the most vicious mass-murderer in history.

And those who had fought with him could not be more honored.

**..x''**

_The old me is dead and gone,_

_Dead and Gone. –JT and TI_

**..x''**

**OWARI**

**A/N: Hooray for Mello. Jeez, I love that guy.**


	18. Contempt

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. You don't sue, I don't sic my flying monkeys on you. 

**A/N: TYVM to padsy, Rizera, and Tails-Coyote-Carnivore for reviewing; also to Usagi Uchiha for Favoriting! Thanks so much!!**

**Contempt**

**--.**

"_Curiosity killed the cat, but for a while I was a suspect." -?_

**--.**

Wammy's House is a very empty place when he first arrives.

Beyond could probably count the number of inhabitants on his own fingers, without having to use any of them over.

There is Quillish Wammy _(3, 42, 57, 23, 0)_, the Head, the Big Cheese, the one who takes them from the ruins of what used to be their lives; whisks them away and brings them here, where things may or may not be better.

There is A Andrews _(24, 1, 76, 13, 99)_, the Alternate, the Successor, the Next-In-Line boy who's so weak and fragile it makes Beyond want to laugh and spit at the same time; the delicate finger puppet, the pawn still singed by the flames that stole away his old life.

There is L Lawliet of course _(75, 23, 1, 3, 6, 2)_, the Number One, the goal Beyond is supposed to strive to attain, the pale and expressionless doll who cannot think for himself, can only think in terms of logic and sensibility; and that is probably why he's so admired.

There are assorted professors and such, all with their own numbers and names; but Beyond doesn't bother with them because their death-days are still far away, and nobody with such a long lifespan remaining can possibly be interesting. _(It is that fact that makes him take an interest in L and A-all things considered, their numbers will hit zero relatively soon, and he wonders how those incidents will play out..)_

As time goes on the House slowly fills; genius children never seem quite so obsolete when they are all jammed together in one place.

Beyond watches from afar as the Wammy bloodline weakens; he looks down on his successors with something akin to contempt.

Where has the coldness gone? The pure intellect, undiluted by such petty things as emotion and humanity? The drive, the willingness to trample anything, destroy anything, in order to make it to the top? Where is the bit of their minds that refuses to accept or allow failure-the bit of the mind that drove A to his suicide?

Those perfect, essential lessons-where have they gone?

Beyond watches the new children who call Wammy's House home, and he shakes his head, and he wonders.

_What is wrong with the world these days?_

**A/N: Written at a ridiculous hour of the morning. And thus, probably nonsensical.**


	19. Competition

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. You don't sue, I don't sic my flying monkeys on you. 

**A/N: Thanks lots to Tails-=Coyote-Carnivore, Rizera, and Arnold the Pygmy Puff for your reviews.**

**Still exhausted. Let the improbable theories run wild.**

.RCS.

"_Warning: Trespassers will be shot."_

.RCS.

They were Wammy's Kids at the same time; the dates of their arrivals were only days apart.

Contrary to belief, L was not the golden child of the original three. He was not number one. He was not even number two.

A was always the favorite; hence the nickname. He was an emotional child at heart, but he managed to keep his feelings under wraps and focus on the task at hand.

B was eternally overshadowed; even his new name threw his inferiority back in his face. He was number two. Always, always, _always_.

B and A fought constantly. Their rivalry would have been legendary, except that there were no 'chatty' kids around to spread the stories.

Getting back to L. L was a strange one. He kept to himself more than was normal even for orphaned prodigies; although he did have a strange sort of on-and-off friendship with B. He was a genius, yes, but that was nothing really special at Wammy's. In fact, genius was expected at Wammy's.

Overall-he wasn't number one. And he didn't really seem to care.

The unspoken competition between the three became something of a joke among the staff; no matter how hard _this_ kid tried or how badly _that_ kid slipped up, the ratings never changed. A always stood smugly on his Number One podium. B sulked on the second-place platform. And L, young number Three, uncaringly sucked his thumb; apathetic about it all.

It was when they hit the teenage years that things began to shift. No one was really sure what happened, exactly; all they knew was that something inexplicable changed.

The rivalry that burned between A and B heated up more than ever as L sat forgotten on the sidelines. But B fed off of the growing pressure. A wilted beneath its fury.

B beat A on a test for the first time ever. One test wasn't much; it could always be chalked up to a bad day or a fluke. All the same, A had slipped off of his precious podium, and was now clinging to it with his fingernails because that was all he could do.

It happened again. And again. A was falling from grace, and his teachers watched with morbid curiosity, waiting to see just how hard he would hit the ground. B exalted. He caressed his new podium lovingly and shot A a vicious smirk.

All the while, L silently moved in the shadows, observing, working, struggling. Eventually, he made his grand entrance with a bang-his grades suddenly skyrocketed, matching and almost surpassing B's. And, of course, crushing A's to dust.

That was probably the last nail in the coffin. Literally. A killed himself and left the best to their business.

The loss of his longtime rival and unwilling friend did something to B's brilliant mind. Because brilliant minds are so easily twisted. Twisted out of focus; and that's exactly what he did. He lost focus.

It was only for a brief moment, but it was enough. L shot ahead, and that was it. B had peaked too early, and was being left behind by a small boy who now seemed incapable of doing wrong.

B left Wammy's eventually, and proved his unmatched skill at gruesome murders. Maybe that satisfied him. Maybe it didn't. Maybe, with his wild mind, he couldn't even tell.

And L, of course, rode the wave of success for twelve more years, banishing any trace of emotion and copying the best traits of B and A. Using them. So in a way, all three of them were the famous detective who had L's name. Sort of. But not really.

They were some strange kids, those Prodigal Three…

**.RCS.**

"_Warning: Survivors will be shot again." -?_

**.RCS.**

**A/N: Don't ask me. Please. My brain is shutting down. -.-;**

**I've been focusing on the Prodigal Three a lot. Wonder why that is..**


	20. Journalist

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. You don't sue, I don't sic my flying monkeys on you. 

**A/N: My thanks to Tails-Coyote-Carnivore and Rizera for reviewing, and also to Featherz for Alerting!**

**Journalist**

**.^.**

The Wammy's Kids were all groomed to succeed L as a great detective. But of course, only one child could actually achieve that position. The others, after hitting eighteen, all had to find their own way in the world just like everybody else.

Linda went to college and majored in art and journalism. It was an interesting combination. She graduated in less than a year.

Art was her real passion, but writing-especially nonfiction-had become a hobby as well, somewhere along the way. She found a job working for an unusual newspaper that allowed her to draw the illustrations for her articles instead of using photography. It was a semi-normal job in a semi-normal city and it made her feel happy and semi-normal.

One day near the end of January, Linda-recently 21-received a call from her boss, insisting she go and document the end of a tragic event-the kidnapping and now death of Kira spokesperson Kiyomi Takada.

Linda grabbed her work sketchpad and one of the pens that she always had scattered about the apartment, and hurried to the scene. Her first assignment was to take a look at one of the two co-conspirators, who had been shot dead by Takada's bodyguards following a high-speed car chase.

Her journaling jobs, and the pictures she had to draw for it, had made her accustomed to dead bodies. She'd seen some grotesque things in the past few years. But nothing could have prepared her for what she saw lying in the road.

It was a young man, red-headed, the stub of a cold cigarette sticking out of his mouth. There were goggles on his head, and a striped shirt blazed from underneath a furry vest. Aforementioned vest was marred by bloody holes wrought by unforgiving bullets; the same blood ran down the man's face.

Linda froze. The pad and pen both fell from her hand, hitting the pavement with a muted clatter.

_Matt._

It couldn't be. It couldn't be him.

But it was.

She hadn't seen him since he left Wammy's to chase after their reckless idiot of a friend. And now here he was, a bloody mess, left behind to rot on the pavement while others pondered this nameless criminal.

Personal connections aside, Linda still had a job to do. She retrieved her instruments and drew with trembling fingers. The work was shoddy, but she could fix it later. She suddenly had an awful feeling about the second part of her assignment.

The location was a church in a remote part of the city. A church which had recently suffered severe damage from a fire that had been lit within. There were two bodies for Linda to document here. One was Takada's. The other had not been identified.

Forcing herself not to wince at both the sight and smell of charred, blackened remains, Linda sketched the first corpse, a woman's. Takada's. Then she moved on to the skeleton of a delivery truck, where the second corpse was supposed to be.

Holding her breath, she gently pushed open what remained of the truck's door. The sight that met her eyes was that which was expected-a black pile of ash that had once been a living human being, bent over the steering wheel, features unrecognizable.

But features weren't necessary, because Linda's trained eye caught sight of something small, something shiny that had miraculously survived the raging flames. The object-and the implications that came with it-brought tears to her eyes.

It was a cross. A golden rosary hanging from the neck of the black body. She had seen it thousands of times in her youth, at Wammy's, and could have recognized it anywhere. It belonged to Mello, which meant her suspicions were horribly correct.

She sketched him with painstaking care, for reasons she wasn't quite sure of. Then she ran to her workplace, all but threw the drawings at her boss, and bolted home. There, she cried for her best friends, two boys she had hardly even known.

**.^.Fin**

**A/N: Yay, Linda gets some spotlight! About time, right? XD**


	21. Intro 2: River

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. You don't sue, I don't sic my flying monkeys on you. 

**A/N: TYVM to mangaluver34, Featherz, Tails-Coyote-Carnivore and Rizera for reviewing, Possessed4evr for Alerting, Sonny101 for Favoriting and Alerting, and Grace Raven for reviewing, Alerting and Favoriting! Thanks so much!!**

**Once more, I am going to twist the laws of canon until they break.**

**Intro.3: River**

**444**

"_There used to be a real me, but I had it surgically removed." –Peter Sellers_

**444**

He is small even for his age, Nate River, but three times as smart as any other child around.

His mother calls him precious. His father calls him strange. They both watch their tiny blond son out of the corners of their eyes, silently wondering what new oddity is going to make itself known. Nate feels their gazes and ignores them.

He goes to preschool and plays, bored, with handheld puzzles. His teachers have given up on trying to stump him and now prefer to pretend he does not exist.

His mother comes to pick him up from school, always. It's routine. It's safe. It's constant.

One day she does not come.

The boy waits outside, his face remaining colorless even while the wind whips it, his light hair collecting quickly melted flakes of snow. The teachers lock up and go home without a backwards glance at the ghostly child that scares them so.

Eventually the scarce sunlight begins to fade into darkness, and young Nate decides to take matters into his own pale hands and walk home alone. It isn't far.

He reaches his house in a matter of minutes, and upon touching the cold metal of the door handle knows that something is off.

The door is locked. The door is never locked. His father only locks it when he is afraid of someone or something outside; it's an unusual quirk.

Fear and caution battle curiosity. Curiosity prevails after his adept mind calmly points out a lack of other options. It is the middle of winter and daylight is fast vanishing.

He goes around to the back door (which is never locked, period) and slips through.

The lights are all off.

The creak of the old wooden floor, so familiar, sounds eerie to him. Every sense is heightened, on alert-even an un-prodigious child could have sensed the _wrong_-ness in the atmosphere.

Or smelled the blood. Any dolt could have smelled the blood.

The next minute or so are the seconds forgotten (_best_ forgotten) and buried. Seconds in which a child's hair turns white as the shock of seeing his parents dead and dismembered begins to settle like a bad smell-like the smell of this _blood_ that's everywhere, like a red river, imprinting itself permanently in his brilliant, terrified mind.

Those are the seconds, the heartbeats, the moments in which the course of a future is altered, and the child turns and screams. Screams for the first and last time in his life. Screams as he comes face to face with a demon with black hair and eyes that shine with forbidden knowledge. A demon who has no interest in him, for whatever reason.

A demon who smiles a wide and mad smile, and mutters a string of numbers under his breath while fixing his gaze on a spot directly above the boy's head. A demon who says "Hello, Nate" in a friendly voice and vanishes without looking him in the eye.

The snow falls, a neighbor eventually gets curious, and before Nate knows it he is being taken to an orphanage.

Time flies, memories are burned, and Nate doesn't cry.

**4Fin**

**A/N: Don't ask, because my guess is as good as yours.**


	22. Family

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. You don't sue, I don't sic my flying monkeys on you. 

**A/N: Thanks to mangaluver34, Tails-Coyote-Carnivore, Bloody Mello and Rizera for reviewing! It's another Near drabble..**

**-.-**

"_I am not afraid to keep on living." –My Chemical Romance_

**-.-**

Mello. Matt.

Dead. Gone.

Near shook his white head as if to rid himself of the irksome fly that was his thoughts; going in circles whilst going nowhere, buzzing until he was ready to see red and go mad.

They weren't his friends. They had never been his friends. Mello hated him, and Matt was too loyal to Mello to attempt any sort of friendship back at Wammy's. Not that Near would have accepted such an attempt, anyway.

Because that was what he did. He pushed people away, by force if necessary (though it rarely was).

Because that was what L did, and what was expected of a serious successor to that iconic name.

Perhaps he had been a little bit jealous of the two, some piece of him reflected without his mind's volition. Mello was loud and rowdy and broke every single rule; Matt basically did what he wanted, though more quietly than his blond friend.

They had excitement and explosions and action, whereas Near sat hunched over in his dark little corner of the world and solved things with silent brainpower. They had each other and a lasting friendship that endured any and everything. Near had absolutely no one, just the ghosts of dead family and the voices in his mind that hissed nasty what-ifs.

They had honorable deaths. They went out in a blaze of glory. They fell fighting.

Near lived.

He figured that could be interpreted as smarts or cowardice, depending on the viewpoint; after all, some would consider self-preservation in itself an act of cowardice. But was it still such if he kept himself alive in order to solve a case that was killing thousands? Or was that merely justification, which he loathed in the first place?

..Yes, this. This was the fly. An endlessly annoying bug that flew into his ears and buzzed around in his brain. One that he could neither catch nor squash, except perhaps by means of a lobotomy. Hmm… No, no, he couldn't do that. After all, he was L. And regardless of who 'Near' really was, the world needed 'L'.

He returned his thoughts to the current issue, determined this time to keep it concise and sure.

Matt and Mello had died. They had been no friends of his, yet Near still felt a strange, alien coldness solidifying in his gut when he received the news.

No, they weren't friends. They weren't even quite comrades. They were more like family, which was the conclusion Near would reach if he decided to be honest with himself (which he didn't).

And now they were only memories, just another form of family that was gone and scattered to the winds like so many dead ashes.


	23. Intro 3: Beyond

Disclaimer: I'm writing _fanfiction_, for crying out loud. You make the call. I also do not own any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble.

**A/N: Thanks very much to Featherz, sakuragawa and Rizera for reviewing!! BB is back..please don't kill me..**

**Intro.4: Beyond**

**/:\**

"_Shut your mouth; we've heard it all." -Atreyu_

**/:\**

He knew when they would die. Of course. He had the eyes of a God, so of course he knew.

His father was quiet, and worked hard despite the fact that effort never brought his household much money.

His mother was cold and then hot, and back when he actually cared, he preferred the former. Being ignored was better than being beaten. She seemed to prefer being 'hot', however, and what she wanted went.

Sometimes his father looked at the bruises and cuts on the body of his son. Mostly he looked through them.

Beyond knew his father's deathdate and didn't particularly care. His mother might miss the money, but since when did he owe that temperamental woman anything?

Benign Birthday died. Beyond's mother screeched and pulled at her hair and burned her son, leaving scars that he would later cover with white makeup that made him look like L.

The night before his mother's death, he understood. He knew she was going to the train station and made the connection. With this powerful knowledge, he decided to play a little game: If she left him alone all through noon tomorrow-her departure time-then he would stop her. He would play God and let her live, bestow upon her his generous mercy.

The night passed and he wasn't touched or acknowledged. Then at 11:55, five minutes before she was set to leave, she had another episode. Beyond was nearby.

The resulting scars never healed, never even came close.

Bleeding in several different ways, the black-haired child with the glittering eyes watched expressionlessly as his mother left the house to get to her appointment with doom.

If she had let him be, he would have saved her.

But she didn't, so he didn't.

The door swung shut with finality.

**/:Fin**

**A/N: -is writing on chalkboard- I will write about other Wammy's Kids. I will write about other Wammy's Kids.**


	24. Cross

Disclaimer: I'm writing _fanfiction_, for crying out loud. You make the call. I also do not own any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble.

**A/N: TYVM to Rizera and Tails-Coyote-Carnivore for reviewing, Nehan Shinzui34 for reviewing and Favoriting, and Killer May for Alerting! I'm gonna warn you now: Although I love Mello, I do have fun torturing him. Just something to remember. ;)**

**0O0**

"_Dude looks like a lady!" -Aerosmith_

**0O0**

"Come _on_, Mello, it wouldn't kill you to-"

"HELL NO!"

Matt glanced up from his Gameboy, vaguely annoyed, as two of his fellow Wammy's Kids entered his room whilst making an irritating amount of noise. His loudmouth of a best friend, Mello, was obviously attempting to escape the frowning blonde girl tagging along behind him.

"But it's for a project!" said girl pleaded. "Please, Mel, _please_?"

"Forget it!" Mello snapped, face growing redder by the second.

Matt decided he should probably intervene before things got violent-Mello had never hit a girl before, but if anyone could push him to break his own rules of moral conduct, it was this girl.

"Hey, Linda," the redhead greeted her.

She managed to shoot a weary-looking smile in his direction. "Hiya, Matt."

Matt glanced sideways, saw the steam pouring from Mello's ears, and figured it was best to keep him out of the conversation for the time being.

"Sooo...Dare I ask?" he muttered, lowering his voice.

The artist rolled her eyes. "Mel's being unreasonable," she responded, not bothering to keep her own voice down. "All I want from him is one tiny little favor, and he acts like I want him to give up chocolate or something. Jeez."

"The 'favor' you're asking is neither tiny nor little!" Mello snarled. "I'm NEVER doing it! _EVER_!!"

Matt winced. He was pretty sure one of his eardrums had just been sacrificed to the blond's obvious wrath.

"So what's this project you mentioned?" he tried, steering the conversation back towards Linda.

She smiled. "The theme is 'second-guessing'," she explained, eyes shining with the passion she only ever gave her art. "The idea is to draw something that makes the viewer unsure of what he's seeing. And I _really_ need Mello's help," she added, resorting to her pleading tone again and turning in the other boy's direction. "I know I'll get a great grade if he does this for me."

Matt stared at her. "Lin, your art grades are always perfect," he pointed out.

She pouted. "This could be one of my best works yet! I'm not about to sacrifice it just because this jerk-" she gestured furiously at Mello "-feels uncomfortable!" Her tone had gone from unhappy to fierce in a matter of moments. Linda, Matt noted, could be quite scary when she wanted to be.

"Uh-wait, why Mello? Why won't anyone else do? What are you planning on drawing, anyway?" Matt asked, tripping over himself with multiple questions.

Linda grinned in a way that could be described as evil.

"I want him to crossdress for me."

A sputter of rage came from the subject of their discussion. Matt's jaw hit the floor with a resounding crash, and he scrambled to pick it up.

"You _what_?" he managed, collecting himself more or less.

"Crossdressing," she repeated clearly. "If I dressed Mels up as a girl, maybe even put some makeup on him, and then drew it.." A dreamy look came over her face. "It'd be absolutely perfect." Her expression cleared. "And that's why it can't be anyone else. He's easily the girliest guy at Wammy's, and that's the idea-people looking at my drawing won't know if they're seeing a guy or a girl! See?" She beamed, apparently not noticing Mello's fuming or Matt's struggle not to laugh.

"Yeah, it's a real riot," Mello growled. "Well you can go find some guy with no pride, Linda, because there's nothing you can say that'd make me-"

"I really didn't want it to come to this," Linda cut in, "but you leave me no choice." Her eyes gleamed.

"I know where your chocolate stash is."

Mello froze.

"You don't."

"Yes, I do," she replied pleasantly. "I could easily grab every bar of chocolate, light a match, and-"

Matt slipped out of the room. He no longer had any place there..besides, he _really_ didn't want to be around if Mello or Linda blew their stack.

**0O0**

Less than a week later, Linda's newest sketch was the talk of the House.

Matt had only caught a brief glimpse of it (before Mello gripped his arm and threatened him with agonizing bodily harm if he looked any longer), but the little he saw was certainly memorable. The sight of Mello in a flapper dress and shockingly well-done makeup was not one easily forgotten.

"I can't believe you got him to do it," the bewildered gamer told Linda afterwards.

She just smirked. "Threatening his chocolate," she informed him happily, "does wonders."

**0Owari**

**A/N: Two things: One-ideas evidently flock to me when I'm exhausted. And two-I just thought up a fun crossover pairing: LinDei. LindaxDeidara. XD**


	25. Rejected

Disclaimer: I'm writing _fanfiction_, for crying out loud. You make the call. I also do not own any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble.

**A/N: TYVM to Rizera, Tails-Coyote-Carnivore, mangaluver34, KillerMay, and sakuragawa for reviewing!! WE'VE HIT 50 REVIEWS!!! –glomps everyone-**

**Rejected**

**-:-**

"_You've got all the right friends in all the right places;_

_Yeah, we're going down." -OneRepublic_

**-:-**

"Good luck with your…whatever it is," Matt concluded awkwardly. "Jeez, Lin, do you have to be so mysterious?"

"Yep," the blonde fifteen-year-old replied, flashing a smile that would only be revealed as weak under intense observation. "Thanks."

The gamer grinned in a lopsided sort of way. "See you around then." And he was gone.

Linda waited till she could no longer see his back, then bolted.

She said her apologies to whoever she bumped into but didn't bother hanging around to see if they accepted the halfhearted 'sorry'. She was in a hurry. The letter might have come today.

The very idea of that letter had lingered in the back of her mind for a long time, and finally she had written something that would warrant a response in this form. Just getting her request through to the person she wanted an answer from, she'd had to pull every string she could, call in every favor she'd amassed. And after her own letter had been posted, the possibility of a response haunted her to the point where she could barely focus on anything else.

Linda found herself in front of her room, and with trembling fingers threw open the door.

There. On the bedside table. A thin, pale, nondescript envelope.

Swallowing hard, she moved forward, shutting the door behind her. She slowly grabbed the envelope and peeled it open, being ridiculously careful not to rip any part of it.

The letter, the response, the sheet of paper in her quivering hand. Shimmering eyes closed.

Her future. Her freedom. Her release. Her fondest wish-would it be granted or burned? The answer lay written on this plain piece of paper.

Nodding to herself with false confidence-a thin veil for terror-she unfolded the paper, read the contents…

And dropped it.

A strange, unidentifiable numbness was spreading throughout her body. Her heart, which had been pounding so desperately hard moments ago, now seemed to have stopped entirely.

Wetness on her face, salty-tasting water sliding down pale cheeks in thin, tickling trails. She wondered if it was rain, before realizing that she wasn't outside.

Sinking to her knees, Linda wondered if this was what had driven A, one of Wammy's Prodigal Three, to his suicide.

Because if it was, she could understand him completely.

**-:-**

_To Miss Linda, in response to her letter:_

_Your request to leave Wammy's House three years early has been denied._

_Please continue to work hard._

_L._

**-:Fin**

**A/N: Huzzah for vague drabbles! Strange..I didn't write much of Linda before, but now I can't seem to get her off of my mind..**


	26. Noodle

I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. Not being sued would make my day! ^_^

**A/N: TYVM Rizera, mangaluver34, padsy and Tails-Coyote-Carnivore for reviewing; also xxBlueBird for Alerting! **

**Let us all take a moment to praise the Internet gods for dA. Inspiration flourishes there. Oh, and..beware the semi-crack. Just saying. XD**

**Noodle**

**{-]**

"_All my best friends are metalheads." –Less Than Jake_

**{-]**

The Wammy's Kids had something like a pool party. Once.

The idea was E's fault. E was a skinny, long-legged orphan with a love of all things water. One year she appealed to Quillish Wammy himself and begged him to take them to a pool because their childhoods would be so deprived otherwise (let it be known that E was strange, even by House standards).

Quillish announced that he was taking a much-deserved vacation and left poor Roger to deal with the inevitable mess. And Roger, ever the jaded subordinate, caved.

E immediately told everyone she came across of her success; as a result, by the end of the day Roger had nearly 50 kids prepared to tag along.

There were several problems with the excursion that the older man could see, number one being the migraine that would almost certainly manifest itself.

Number two was the fact that none of the children had swimsuits.

And number three was the fact that it was the middle of autumn, and E had vehemently refused to even consider going to an indoor pool because "It just wasn't the same."

A B and L, being the oldest, were given the task of getting the rest of the poolgoers in and out of a swimsuit shop as quickly and painlessly as possible, while Roger made arrangements with a recreational center to temporarily re-open their outdoor pool. Only at the last possible second-as in, when children were actually cannonballing into the water-did it occur to Roger that he had no idea which kids, if any, could actually swim.

Well. At least there was lifeguard equipment nearby?

**{-]**

Things went relatively well for a while.

Linda sat on a sun chair and scribbled frantically in her sketchbook.

A insisted that he was allergic to water and fairly ran when a few troublemakers tried to splash him.

B, who was probably cackling away inside of his demented little mind, took great pleasure in swimming silently underwater and popping up into unsuspecting faces.

Matt floated lazily on his back for most of the venture, his hair pooling around him like some rare red jellyfish; while Mello squirted everyone within range using a water pistol he'd managed to sneak out of the store.

L merely poked at the water with his fingers; when asked why he didn't get in, he answered that he couldn't swim. Suggestions that he use a water noodle (several of which the pool staff had generously provided) were met with an icy stare and the cynical statement: "You expect me to entrust my life to something called a '_water noodle_'?"

Near slipped underwater for long periods of time, convincing many people several times that he had actually drowned, and leading half the House population to believe he was part fish by the day's end.

Roger, sitting in a chair at the edge of the pool, swallowed unhealthy amounts of aspirin and fretted over how many kids would have to drown before no amount of bribes could keep the House from being shut down.

And this was what passed for 'relatively well'.

Then came the havoc, which Roger had seen coming from a mile away; he just didn't know what form it would take.

Nobody was quite sure who started it, although later inspection narrowed the suspects down to B, E and Near (yes, Near-it's always the quiet ones). All we can be sure of is that A was the first victim.

Five kids climbed out of the pool without warning and headed straight for A, who was spread out on a towel in the shadiest spot he could reach and had his eyes closed, the poor sucker. They picked him up by his arms and legs and, gleefully ignoring his pleas for release, dumped him unceremoniously into the water.

A resurfaced a few seconds later (with the help of a few more sympathetic children-A was one of the unlucky who couldn't swim at all), wincing at the cold and glaring at his attackers (who, by this point, were in hysterics).

This success emboldened the marauders, who turned their viciously gleaming eyes next to the spaced-out, hapless Roger.

Quietly, painstakingly, they crept up behind their cantankerous caretaker. A grinning Mello mouthed the signal: _'Three..two…__**one**__!'_

And they shoved Roger, chair and all, into the pool.

The results were mixed. Some kids bolted back to the car without even grabbing a towel, such was their fear of retribution (even if they hadn't done anything). Most of the witnesses laughed, but sobered as the old man's head broke through the water's surface.

The little group of actual perpetrators, however, were laughing so hard that tears were pouring from their eyes, and the sight of a soaked and livid Roger only made their sides split further.

In fact, such was their mirth that they didn't even notice Roger was climbing from the pool until he was directly in front of them.

Oh, the results were not pretty. Not one iota.

**{-]**

The group known as the Soakers were not seen again for several weeks.

Quillish Wammy eventually returned and thanked heaven that he had saved his vacation time for all those years.

A, as it turned out, actually did have an allergic reaction to the pool water, and had to be hospitalized. B visited A every day (after he himself was released from punishment) to bring him get-well cards and to laugh at him.

47 Wammy's Kids came down with pneumonia due to their swimming outside in 32-degree weather, turning the House into an ICU full of germs and running noses for weeks on end.

Roger, after two failed petitions to have E removed from the premises altogether, settled for buying more aspirin and resolving never, _never_ to bring his charges within 100 feet of a swimming pool for the rest of his natural life.

**[:Finis**

**A/N: Ah, poor Roger, he suffers so. XD**


	27. Questions

I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. Not being sued would make my day! ^_^

**A/N: TYVM mangaluver, sakuragawa and Rizera for reviewing, and to CeruleanCypher for reviewing and Favoriting!! Special thanks to Tails-Coyote-Carnivore, who wins the award for Fastest Reviewing-seriously, she reviewed 'Noodle' about 30 seconds after it was posted. XD**

**Questions**

**)0(**

"_The best defense against the atom bomb is not to be around when it goes off." -?_

**)0(**

It had been an odd day.

Linda shook her head and tried to refocus on her sketchpad, but the memories of the day's event kept coming back to pester her. _And to think,_ she noted wryly, _I thought I'd seen everything. I thought life would settle into a nice, boring, lull-ish pattern after I left Wammy's._

But no. She'd only been out of the House five months (enough time to finally establish herself in the professional art world), and already a major weirdness had occurred.

She'd been walking home, minding her own business, when suddenly a pair of men had stopped her. They'd spoken her name in badly accented English.

Looking at them, listening to their accents, Linda had made an educated guess-that they were Japanese. She threw them a bone and asked them what they wanted in their native language.

The younger one, looking relieved that he wouldn't have to attempt conversation in a dialect he knew little about, introduced himself as Touta Matsuda. His partner was Suichi Aizawa. They said they were in the Japanese police force, and that they needed a favor.

The favor in question froze her. They wanted her to draw portraits of Mello and Near, who had both vanished from Wammy's long before she'd left.

After a pause of undetermined length, she did as they requested. She drew the boys as she remembered them, and after the agents departed she was left with the same old unanswerable questions. She'd hoped she wouldn't have to go over them again-that she could just accept that all of her friends were gone along with her past and that she could do nothing about it.

_Where did Mello go, and why?_ Distraught, Linda had asked herself that very question nonstop for _weeks_ after he'd left. And she'd been unable to come up with a logical answer.

_Why did Matt leave? Where is he now?_ Those were slightly easier to answer. Everybody figured he'd followed Mello, his best friend, as he always had. Despite being the left-behind third wheel once again, Linda had tried to comfort herself with the knowledge that her friends were together somewhere. But she just couldn't manage to cheer herself up, not through the resulting months of loneliness.

_Why did Near have to go?_ It hadn't been until much later that she'd figured out L was dead. In the meantime she had mulled over clear mental images of a pale boy hunched over his toys, a child to anyone who didn't look closely, and wondered if he could survive with some semblance of happiness in the harsh world he'd entered.

These were the things she considered now, along with new questions brought on by the policemen. Had her old friends done something wrong?

"Maybe Mello joined the mafia," she joked to herself with a low chuckle. "Maybe he's going to be arrested."

Linda's smile faded. Her mouth went dry as she continued her monologue.

"Maybe he's killed someone. Maybe they're going to kill him."

The lump rose to her throat with a cruel lack of warning. She touched her forehead to her sketchpad, knowing her tears would ruin the work she'd done and not really caring.

_Where are you guys? _

_Why didn't you ever try to contact me?_

_What have you done?_

That last one was the most repetitive.

_What have you done? What have you done?_

**)0Fin**

**A/N: Well that was odd. I plan on delving more into Linda's world post-Mello, Matt and Near, JSYK.**


	28. Exchange

I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. Not being sued would make my day! ^_^

**A/N: TYVM Rizera, mangaluver34 and Tails-Coyote-Carnivore for reviewing!**

**:-:**

"_I can feel you breathing_

_and it's keeping me awake._

_Can you feel it beating?_

_My heart's sinking like a weight." -Yellowcard_

**:-:**

He was stuck guarding her-the police chief's daughter, the means to an end, the bait in his best friend's trap.

He couldn't say he agreed with Mello's methods. Joining the mafia, kidnapping a girl..it all seemed so extreme. But then, Mello had always been extreme. And Matt had signed himself up for this when he finally tracked the blond down after years of searching.

Sighing, the redhead paused his game and glanced into the cell. He'd been instructed to do so from time to time, to ensure that she didn't bite her tongue off or anything. Just by looking at her, Matt doubted she would do it. But if she did, Mello would bite his head off and then shoot him, so he checked just to stay on the safe side.

Negative. No blood. The girl was still huddled against the wall. Except now she was shaking.

_What the..it's not cold in here, so why is she-_ The answer smacked him upside the head. _She's crying,_ he realized, berating himself for his stupidity. _Of __**course**__ she's crying. She got dragged off the street by a couple of giant mafia muscleheads, taken to the other end of the world, tossed into a cell..now she doesn't know what's going to happen to her. _

_And she hasn't even done anything._

His better judgment duked it out with his conscience for a few seconds before sympathy took over.

"Hey," he ventured cautiously. "You okay in there?"

_I sound like an idiot. And Mello's going to skin me alive._

She inhaled sharply and turned to face him, tears glistening on her skin and in her eyes. Her nose was running. It wasn't an attractive look, not that Matt cared.

"Uh..I would give you a tissue or something, but.." He gestured to the emptiness around him uncomfortably.

The girl continued to stare at him. Then she spoke-or tried to; the cloth around her mouth prevented it. Giving up on coherent speech, she sent him a pleading look.

Matt resisted the urge to bolt before he damned himself even more. _How much danger can she possibly be?_ "I'll take the cloth off your mouth, but if you start screaming, I'm putting it back on," he grumbled, feeling ridiculous.

She nodded and moved toward the bars. Matt reached through and carefully removed the strip of fabric. _That settles it. Mel will definitely murder me._

"Thank you." Her voice was raspy and rough from lack of use and from crying.

He responded in Japanese. "Don't mention it." _What now?_

"I was asking who you were," she continued quietly. "You don't look like a mafia member."

_Perceptive,_ he observed. _Guess she is the police chief's kid after all._

"I'm not," he shrugged out.

"Then why are you here? You don't look like a kidnap victim either."

"I'm not," he repeated. "One of the..one of the guys is my friend." _Yeah, that sounds great. Best friends with the mafia member who arranged her kidnapping. Brilliant. Why am I telling her this stuff anyway?_

"Oh," was all she said at first. Then, "You must be really loyal if you're willing to go along with stuff like this for him." There was definite bitterness there, which was understandable, of course.

Silence settled over the room again. Eventually it was broken again, this time by Matt.

"I don't think you deserve to be in there." The words left his mouth without his brain's volition. "You're involved in a mess, that's all. Sorry about your luck." It came out more sarcastic-sounding than he would have liked, but she didn't seem to notice.

"Thanks," she replied in her soft voice.

**:-:**

It was nothing huge; a short exchange between innocent prisoner and guilty warden. And that was all, really.

But it was all it took for Matt to feel some twinge of-of _something_-when she was finally freed.

**:-Finis**

**A/N: That was fuuuun. I never mentioned Sayu's name..huh..**


	29. Extension

I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. Not being sued would make my day! ^_^

**A/N: Thanks to sakuragawa, Rizera, mangaluver34, Nehan Shizui34 and Tails-Coyote-Carnivore for reviewing! B is back, along with another wacky theory. Heh. XD**

**Extension**

**IiI**

"_Something's getting in the way. Something's just about to break." –Breaking Benjamin_

**IiI**

B met L once.

_[Regarding Shinigami Eyes..]_

It wasn't even a meeting, really; it was more like, L had happened to walk by and B had given him a glance in passing.

_[..they are not, when possessed by a human, infallible.]_

_L Lawliet,_ B noted mentally. _L, then. Interesting._ The younger boy's numbers were somewhat disappointing-this 'L' would die relatively young, as so many others did. B didn't know what he had expected to be different.

_[Mortal lifespans, in some rare cases, may not be set in stone.]_

He wondered what the cause would be. Illness? Accident? Would this hailed genius become trapped in a burning building, or perhaps end up as collateral damage in the commission of a terrorist act? The possibilities were many.

_[The only variable that can alter a human lifespan..]_

B didn't know. He didn't particularly care. It wasn't a question that would keep him up all night; after all, if he took the time to consider possible circumstances for every death he saw, he would drive himself utterly mad.

_[..is a sort of outside interference.]_

Later-much later-he would see L's face again, for the second and final time. From his own little corner of MU (was there such a thing as a 'corner' in that endless dark place? He didn't know), looking through a Death God's world-seeing globe, he spared the detective a second glance.

_['Outside' in this instance meaning 'otherwordly'. Such as a Shinigami's tool, a Death Note.]_

What he saw interested him in a vague, detached sort of way. L's numbers had changed, and given what he had learned and seen in life and in death, B figured he knew the cause. Someone had picked up a Death Note and the result was a shift in L's allotted life. The change itself wasn't what caught his eye.

_[Such changes in mortal longevity are never predictable.]_

What caught his eye was the calculated amount of time L now had, as opposed to the amount he'd had before the Note had interfered and changed his destiny. The lifespan was clear.

_[Sometimes, interference can even become advantageous for the human in question.]_

It had lengthened.

**IiOwariiI**


	30. Trick

I don't own ANYTHING! :D

**A/N: TYVM to Tails-Coyote-Carnivore, Rizera, CeruleanCypher and xmusic24loverx. Special thanks to DeathFruitsMaximumSecrets, who came up with the prompt for this one. Another ficlet in which Roger gets tortured..hopefully this won't become a habit..?**

**Trick**

**=^.^=**

"_Why is it always __**me**__?" –Neville Longbottom_

**=^.^=**

Roger had a bad feeling about this.

He should have known better than to agree, especially after that mentally scarring incident at the pool. The children in his care wreaked enough havoc on a normal day; he didn't want to know what would happen if they got themselves sugarbuzzed.

But they had all fixed him with those accursed puppy-dog eyes; and he had given in, cursing himself all the while, knowing he was going to regret it.

It was Halloween, after all. The Wammy's Kids hadn't gone trick-or-treating in Roger's charge since 1982, which was an incident that had only stopped giving him nightmares after many sessions of intensive therapy. So, a candy store was the next best thing.

Upon their arrival, Roger instructed the prodigies that they could each pick out _one_ treat, and that any troublemakers would immediately forgo the privilege. Then he left them to their own diabolical devices and went next door to buy himself a large bottle of aspirin.

Indecision commenced almost instantly. Mello drooled over the rather large chocolate selection. Matt examined a stack of Nerds with somewhat less than his usual apathy. Linda started silently debating over taffy flavors. A and Near glared at each other over the sole remaining bag of Swedish Fish. B was looking interestedly at bugs stuck in lollipops.

At some point, when the mental debate of 'This or that?!' became too strenuous, someone pointed out that Roger wasn't there.

Of course, this lead to a temporary bout of anarchy.

Inwardly devious but looking convincingly innocent, B walked up to the counter with an armful of bug-filled and blood-flavored lollipops. He showed the woman at the counter his stash.

"Please put it on my grandfather's tab," he said sweetly.

The saleslady blinked, then shrugged and ran up his order. B went to the car, shooting his friends a triumphant look as he did so.

There was a sudden scramble as the remaining Wammy's Kids realized the implications of what had just happened and scurried to grab as much candy as they possibly could.

The saleslady got suspicious after the fourth child came up to her with a big grin and a bigger pile of sweets. It was Linda who saved the day there. Giving the woman her best 'tragic-yet-carrying-on' look, she said, "Y'see, ma'am, we're all hospital kids-terminally ill, you see-and can't go out on Halloween because we'll catch something."

The others caught on and tried to look appropriately woeful as she continued. "So Grandfather's letting us buy lots of candy tonight, to make up for it." A wobbly, hopeful smile sealed the deal. The woman behind the counter started tearing up and didn't raise any questions, causing Mello to disguise the word '_Stupid'_ as a cough and almost blow the whole thing by not doing it well.

They had all gotten themselves back into the car by the time Roger stepped apprehensively back into the store and, surprised that the police hadn't shown up yet, went to pay for the items.

Needless to say, the total bill nearly gave him a heart attack. After a few minutes of sputtering, he gave the woman his credit card and mourned the loss of half a year's pay.

"I think it's extremely sweet that you're doing this for those poor children," the saleslady told him with a smile. "They're very brave little things."

Roger froze. If someone was complimenting the children in his care, it usually meant that they had been lied to.

"Ah-why are they brave, exactly?" he asked with pained politeness.

She gave him a confused look. "They're terminally ill, of course! And handling it very well for their ages."

The old man connected the dots in a manner of seconds. He sent the woman a smile that undoubtedly hid murderous intent, then got into the car and drove his demonic charges back to Wammy's.

Throughout the drive the kids were overjoyed that their scheme had succeeded. When the car stopped at the orphanage and they had all gotten out, A was the first to see the insane gleam in the eyes of a caretaker pushed several steps to far, and shouted "RUN!"

When Quillish Wammy returned that night (having mysteriously disappeared the moment the subject of Halloween had been broached), he noted the scene before him-that is, children running and screaming or (in B's case) laughing maniacally, Roger huffing like a winded old elephant and chasing after them all with a steak knife, and candy scattered everywhere-and decided never to ask.

**=^.Fin=^.**


	31. Treat

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. You don't sue, I don't sic my flying monkeys on you. 

**A/N: Thanks, Tails-Coyote-Carnivore. And Happy Halloween, everyone!**

**Treat**

**^v^**

"_This is Halloween; this is Halloween." –Nightmare Before Christmas_

**^v^**

"Happy Halloween, L."

The newly-turned-fourteen-year-old nodded to his friend, masking a small sigh. People had been saying those words to each other all day, and quite frankly he was tired of it. Nice as it was to be able to eat all the sweets he wanted without being pestered, L didn't really like Halloween much. It used to be a favorite of his, way back when, but..

Shrugging off old memories, he resumed staring blankly out the window.

"Where is your head?" B inquired.

L blinked and replied, "Off elsewhere, it appears."

"Ah." The taller boy grinned in a falsely innocent way and turned to leave their shared room. At the door he paused without turning around and added, "Happy birthday."

L's eyes widened; he whipped around in disbelief, but B was gone.

_He probably stole the information from one of Roger's drawers,_ the genius figured after a minute of thinking. _He probably knows all of our birthdays by now._

_..But still._

'Happy birthday.' The words reverberated pleasantly in his head, and a slow smile crept across his usually bland features.

'Happy birthday.' Now those were words, L decided, that he wouldn't mind being greeted with on October 31st.

No. He wouldn't mind that at all.

**^vFin^v**

**A/N: This is Prodigy's 31st chapter…it's October 31st…heh. Happy birthday, L!**


	32. Summons

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. You don't sue, I don't sic my flying monkeys on you. 

**A/N: Thanks very much to Rizera, mangaluver34, Tails-Coyote-Carnivore, DeathFruitsMaximumSecrets, AwesomeDeathMonkeysHaveArrived and LimoEmo! Linda had returned; don't shoot me.**

**Summons**

**(:)**

"_How dare you call at all?" -Chevelle_

**(:)**

Linda stood very, very still.

She read the letter again.

And again.

Then, seized by a sudden flurry of movement, she attacked the sheet of paper with an almost mindless violence. She shredded it into pieces until she was satisfied that it could never be put back together again.

Feeling that this was inadequate to express her frustration, Linda inhaled and started screaming.

"Near, you _bastard_!" she screeched, not caring if the neighbors heard. "How dare you! How _dare_ you! You freaking albino _jerk_!" On and on she went, face reddening, until she had exhausted both her throat and her supply of insults. At that point she reread the letter in her head, and it was all she could do to keep from throwing another temper tantrum.

_Dear Miss Linda,_ the letter-well, the _summons_, really-had begun. _The following information is entirely confidential. Your silence is appreciated._

_The current L is dead._ (That had been a shock. She'd found out, somehow, that Near had taken over for L at the conclusion of the first Kira case, and the knowledge that her old school friend was actually dead refused to compute.) _Before his untimely demise, he did something unprecedented. He named you as his successor, on the grounds that you were ranked Fourth at the orphanage of Quillish Wammy, and that none of the current succession contenders are of sufficient age._

_Please return to aforementioned orphanage in order to accept or deny this request. A map is enclosed in the case of a memory lapse. Mr. Roger will meet you at the House to discuss your affairs._

_We trust you understand the gravity of this situation and will act promptly. Thank you for your cooperation._

And that was all. A single half-page letter to shatter the beautiful, normal life she'd built.

Linda couldn't believe the nerve. Did they honestly expect her to drop everything she'd acquired since leaving the House to come and take a position that she'd never even wanted? She'd tried to escape Wammy's early for a reason. She didn't want to be tied down in a detective position, she didn't want to solve horrible crimes and allow her art-her soul-to become a gray and distant memory.

She knew she was being selfish, but she couldn't help it. She didn't want to cut herself off from the world, destroy any chance she had of forging relationships and living a normal life. She didn't want to become withdrawn and emotionless and unable to interact or even smile.

_If I wanted to kill myself, there are many less painful ways in which to do it._

Jaw set, she dug a piece of paper out of a drawer and began to write her response. She'd have it delivered to Roger, who at least had seemed to care about her during her tenure at the House.

_Dear Roger,_ she began. And stopped.

Because something new had just occurred to her. If she didn't take the job, then the current Number One at Wammy's would be dragged from his school and friends to take her place. Near had skipped over those students because he thought them unready, and that uncertainty would break them if they tried to take on the responsibilities of the great L.

_Is that really what I want?_ she wondered. _I can live the life I've always wanted, but a child with no experience will be my replacement at the altar of sacrifice if I choose that._

Linda bit her lip until blood ran down her chin, a thin red river. _I'm the only one who can choose. My life, or the life of some nameless, faceless child just getting used to his life in an orphanage. My dream or that child's innocence. My hopes or his, or hers._

Seconds ticked by as she agonized in silence. _I'll give up everything! I'll become a ghost, trapped and unfeeling. And the new Number One at Wammy's will eventually become L regardless of whether I step up now or not._

_But timing is everything, and this Number One is only a child. A child who'll be absolutely ruined if I toss him or her to the wolves._

_I can't say yes…I can't say no...But I have to choose…!_

The sky grew dark as she argued endlessly with herself. At long last, Linda raised her head and cast her now-glassy gaze to the sheet of paper on the table.

She tightened her grip on her pen, and Linda wrote out her choice.

**(:Owari**


	33. Firewall

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. You don't sue, I don't sic my flying monkeys on you. 

**A/N: TYVM CeruleanCypher, Tails-Coyote-Carnivore, Rizera, Walking-on-the-Promenade and KillerMay!! **

**This one's AU. Oh, and Q ****is a real Wammy's Kid**** from the spin-off novel L Change The World. He/she was a computer genius. Y'know the program Watari used to delete his data when he died? Yeah, that was Q's program.**

**Firewall**

**./.**

"_Had no excuses for the things that we done;_

_We were brave, we were crazy, we were mostly young." –Kenny Chesney_

**./.**

"Three..two.." A checked the stopwatch in his hand. "One. Time's up, you guys."

Two pairs of hands ceased their furious typing. The younger of the two slapped his knee in frustration.

"Twelve seconds!" he complained. "Twelve more seconds and I would've had it!"

"Y'know, I don't think this is legal," Linda piped up.

"Of course it's not legal, you marshmallow," Mello scoffed, taking a bite out of his chocolate bar. "That's what makes it fun."

"Getting back to the _point_," A pressed delicately. "Q? Your progress?"

The brunette leaned back and smirked. "Broke through 28.5 of 30 firewalls," she reported lightly.

"Sorry, Matt," A said, turning to the spurned hacker. "You lose. Doesn't look like anybody can beat Q at the moment."

The redhead scowled and shut his laptop with a bit more force than was strictly necessary. "Twelve more seconds," he muttered darkly.

"Just outta curiosity, what was the target this time?" Mello asked lazily.

A smiled serenely. "I don't think you want to know."

"Never would have pegged you for the criminal type, A. I guess this place corrupts all of us sooner or later," Linda sighed, playing with a loose thread on her seat.

A shrugged sheepishly. "Blame my roommate," he responded. "Beyond is the one who 'corrupted' me. And anyway, we need to entertain ourselves somehow."

"Hear hear," Q agreed dryly, shoving her glasses back up the bridge of her nose.

"Tell you what, Linda," A continued, noting the girl's gloomy look. "I've planned something special for the big House hacking tournament next weekend, and if you want, maybe you can sketch the winner's expression?"

Linda's face lit up. "Good idea! I'll do that!"

Mello's question was, of course, "What are you having them hack into for the 'big one'?"

A just gave him that serene smile again when he answered, "The Pentagon."

**A/N: I can think of so much chaos that could result from that..**


	34. Wonder

I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. Not being sued would make my day! ^_^

**A/N: TYVM Moonshine 369, xxx, Rizera and Tails-Coyote-Carnivore!! My apologies for the delay..other plot bunnies were feasting on my brain. It's been chaos, I tell you. Oh, and Kujo (for all her name's only mentioned once here) ****is another real Wammy's Kid**** from the new spin-off novel.**

**Wonder**

**['}**

"_Are you serious? What goes on in your head?_

_I'm just curious." -Boyzone_

**['}**

"B had a little sister once."

The rest of the room's occupants looked up in surprise-surprise that someone was opening up about their past, for one, and double surprise that that person was BB.

"Yes," the dark-haired prodigy continued. "She was a sweet little thing. And pretty. Drawn and pale, but still pretty. And fragile. So very fragile."

He smiled beatifically. "B loved her. She was her big brother's biggest fan, people said. She was always kind; never noisy or annoying."

Several of the younger children shot each other perplexed looks; looks that clearly wondered where this had come from and where it was going.

"Then one day..." B's voice didn't change, but his formerly cheery expression did a 180. "B gets home from school to find his beloved little sister sprawled out on the floor, with blood going everywhere. And there are bits of her missing."

The group of listeners went simultaneously green.

"Never again, B realizes, will he see her pretty face smiling at him. Never will she laugh and say his name. Never will she make him happy, or talk to him in that sweet little voice. His baby sister is everything, and now his everything is gone…forever."

B ceased his morbidly depressing recital and took in the reactions of everyone around him. A was surreptitiously sniffling into a tissue he had produced from nowhere. Kujo was biting her lip, expression hard and eyes glassy. Linda was full-out sobbing into Matt's arm (the gamers' shirt was quickly getting soaked), while Mello focused a little too hard on a particular spot on the wall.

B allowed this to go on for a few more seconds before his face broke into a wide smile and he chirped, "Just kidding."

And he swept from the room before the other Wammy's Kids came to their senses.

Linda paused in her crying fest and looked to A, who knew B better than anyone (which wasn't saying a lot, but still).

"Was he lying, A?" she asked.

The chestnut-haired boy frowned. "The strange thing is…I really don't know. It would seem just like him to make light of something like that, but on the other hand.."

He trailed off, and the group of genii stared collectively at the spot where B had been sitting. The unanswered question hung heavy in the air.

**[Fin'}**

**A/N: Well, that was strange. But I'm tired, and it's something, right?**


	35. Payphone

I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. Not being sued would make my day! ^_^

**A/N: TYVM Tails-Coyote-Carnivore, CeruleanCypher, Nehan Shinzui34 and Rizera! Lin sure gets contacted a lot, doesn't she? -.-;**

**Payphone**

**-=-**

"_I guess it's safe to say you're never coming back." –Relient K_

**-=-**

The payphone was ringing.

Linda glanced around in confusion. Nobody was standing by the phone. Nobody walking by seemed inclined to pick it up either; perhaps the fact that it was currently a glorious 20 degrees outside (not including wind chill) had something to do with this.

The lack of attention didn't seem to deter the payphone, naturally; it kept ringing in a very persistent manner.

Giving the area around her a final check, the artist sighed and strode over, picking up the bright yellow phone with a firm "Hello?"

"_Lin?"_

Linda's blonde eyebrows knitted together. "_Matt_?"

"_Hey."_ She could almost hear the grin in the gamers' familiar voice.

"What on-how did you know I would be here?" she inquired in disbelief.

"_Trust me, you don't want to know. Not to mention Mello would probably shoot me if I ran up his phone bills trying to explain it; stingy jerk.."_

"Mel's there too?" The shock had worn off to the extent where she was beginning to get excited. After years of no contact, her old friends had finally seen fit to call. Maybe she could figure out where they were and drop in. She could decorate their faces with permanent marker as they slept, like the good old days.

"_Yeah. He says…well, you and I both know he's too 'macho' to actually say anything, but he's greeting you in his mind."_

"Right." A smile spread across her face. "So where are you guys? Are you-"

"_Sorry, I'm not authorized to answer that."_

She sighed. "Of course. Well, are you planning on stopping by anytime soon? Now that you've finally called, you won't be able to get rid of me you know.."

"_Um…No, we won't be visiting anytime…soon."_

Linda caught the pause and the close save. "Matt, what are you two up to?"

A muffled curse came from the other end. _"Dammit, you're breaking up-just wanted to check in, make sure you haven't gotten hit by a bus or anything-"_

The blonde tightened her grip on the phone. "Matt? Matt, if you hang up on me I swear by the Holy Mother of Cows I'll-"

"_It was nice talking to you, Lin."_

A dial tone filled her eardrums with unexpected harshness. Linda drew away and stared at the violently yellow phone in her hand.

Beyond annoyed, she dropped the thing and started walking back home.

"Yeah," she muttered. "Good to hear from you too."

**-=Fin**

**A/N: I've wanted to write that one for a long time.**


	36. Birthday

I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. Not being sued would make my day! ^_^

**A/N: TYVM Tails-Coyote-Carnivore, Ninna-chan, Rizera and Celestrial! The song in the quote..I'm in love w/ that song right now…**

**;';**

"_Whatya want from me?" –Adam Lambert_

**;';**

"Security has been breached, I repeat, _security has been breached_." Matt paused. "Yo, Sheep, this is Zelda. Did you turn your walkie-talkie off again? Over."

Nothing but static.

"_Sheep_. This is Zelda. Come in; this is an emergency, over."

No reply.

"Dammit, Near, talk already!"

"…The swearing was unnecessary."

"Were you not listening? Security-"

"Has been breached," the cool voice interrupted. "Yes, I know."

"What do we do?"

"What's your position?"

"…I'm tied up in the closet."

"..Tied up?"

"Yeah, with rope. Apparently he planned ahead this year."

"Ah. I suppose we should have anticipated that."

"Whatever; all I know is I'm losing all the blood in my hands and feet and have been pressing the walkie-talkie buttons with my tongue. Get over here and help me already."

"Has B also been compromised?"

"Yeah. Mel lured him away with jam; sneaky jerk…"

"Well, were we expecting anything less? This does happen every year, after all."

"You don't need to remind me," the redhead grumbled. "I swear, his is the only birthday in Wammy's that is common knowledge."

"And he doesn't care," Near put in.

Matt snorted. "Obviously. He raids the kitchen on the same day every year. And this year it looks like he's done some extensive planning."

"It would appear so. It looks like we have only one remaining option."

A groan. "You don't mean-"

"Do you see a better choice?"

"I know, but-we promised him we could handle this."

"Evidently we are incapable of holding back the raging force that is Mello."

"Evidently." A sigh. "Fine, get him."

"Very well."

Less than five minutes later Matt was free and rubbing his wrists as an irate but resolute Roger prepared to enter the kitchen. The old man rolled up his sleeves, cleared his throat and opened the door.

The room was in a state of spectacular disarray. The blond firecracker had apparently taken it upon himself to cause as much trouble as possible, as long as he was enjoying himself anyway. The bottle of chocolate syrup had been squirted all over the walls; Matt had no doubt that what wasn't staining the old wallpaper was residing in his friend's stomach.

Several cans of powdered hot cocoa, bought in preparation for the coming snowfall, were lying about with tops popped off and dark powder scattered about.

And a king-sized bag of white chocolate Hershey's Hugs-Mello's least favorite things in the world-appeared to have been melted down and spread everywhere.

The perpetrator was sitting on top of the counter, alternatively digging into a small chocolate cake and an inanely large bag of M&Ms.

Roger cleared his throat pointedly.

Mello noticed them, looked up and grinned hugely.

"What?" he asked. "It's my birthday!"

**;'Fin**

**A/N: Happy birthday, Mello!!**


	37. Decade

I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. Not being sued would make my day! ^_^

**A/N: Thanks Tails-Coyote-Carnivore, Moonshine369, Rizera, Ninna-chan and mangaluver34! **

**100 REVIEWS!!! I LOVE ALL OF YOU GUYS SO FREEKING MUCH!!!**

**Decade**

**[;]**

_Now it falls apart_

_Every night to the sight of the dim stars_

_-PlayRadioPlay_

**[;]**

"Sixty seconds and counting."

Matt glanced sideways, just to confirm that he was resolutely ignored. He was.

"Fifty seconds and counting."

The blond didn't even so much as blink. That was fine.

"Forty seconds and counting."

_Third time's the charm._ The countdown was beginning to grate on his friend's nerves.

"Thirty seconds."

Mello twitched. A small sign of victory.

"Twenty."

Matt looked at the other man hopefully. Said other man frowned. The redhead sighed inwardly.

"Ten seconds. And then you'll have missed it."

Mello glared at him. Matt smiled innocently and continued.

"Seven seconds…six..you'll regret skipping it..five..four…three…"

With a small growl of surrender Mello stood, grumpily, and said a deadpan "Happy New Year."

And he sank back onto the couch just as Matt's mental countdown reached zero.

The gamer grinned. "Works every time. You really do hate missing things."

"Shut up."

"Oh, get a grip. That's the limit of your celebratory attitude throughout the year."

"Do I even want to know why you care?"

"Well, it is a new decade and all…"

"It won't be a new decade until next year, idiot."

"I won't bother arguing with you on that." It was an old debate.

"…"

"You know what?" Matt inquired conversationally. His friend didn't answer, which didn't stop him from continuing. "I think something pretty big's going to happen this year."

Mello snorted. "Oh really. And what gives you that idea?"

Matt shrugged. "Don't know. Just…a feeling."

**[;]**

**Owari**

**[;]**

**A/N: Well…something happened, all right. –winces-**

**So this one was short, random, and just kind of..weird. But I needed to update this, and the New Year idea worked. Hope you enjoyed.**


	38. Mental

I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. Not being sued would make my day! ^_^

**A/N: TYVM Tails-Coyote-Carnivore, padsy, Rizera and Ninna-chan! Happy birthday Naomi Misora! And Happy Valentine's Day, everyone!**

**3**

"_Love is a grave mental disease." –Plato_

**3**

Anyone who has ever lived there could tell you that not a day ever came in Wammy's House that could be classified as 'normal'. Still, there were some days of the year during which the everyday House weirdness broke down into utter madness.

Valentine's Day was one such day.

As an example, examine the following scenarios. They all occurred on a February 14, and all within the space of a few hours.

**3**

Matt observed his friend Linda staring in an oddly conspicuous way at the House's resident madman, one insane BB. The resulting conversation went like this:

"Uh, Lin?"

"I like him."

And that was that.

The gamer walked away, vanished for some time, then returned.

"You artist types are weird," he informed the blonde.

Her response was to get up and boldly confess to BB on the spot. While Matt looked on, horrified and convinced that she was about to be turned into jam, the two left the cafeteria together and didn't return.

The redhead chose to lock the whole incident away and never think of it again.

**3**

Mello entered one of his classes to find a pink-pink!-envelope on his desk. It had a heart-shaped card in it, which was filled with soppy (but expertly composed) poetry and in which he was addressed as 'Marshmello' several times.

He skipped class, found Matt, dragged him out of class as well, and enlisted the redhead to help him burn it.

They did so out on the front lawn, and managed to turn it to cinders by the time Roger came running out in fury.

**3**

L was foolish enough to choose that day as a day to visit his protégées at the House. Upon his entering one classroom, some strange spell took hold and the genius found himself being buried under a wave of ecstatic girls (and yes, a boy or two) that took advantage of the situation to hug him to within an inch of his life.

He never set foot in the House again during the month of February, or in fact any day that bore the number 14.

**3**

Near returned from a brief talk with a traumatized L to find that some overenthusiastic individual had draped all of his toy robots with lace and pink ribbons. And glitter. Fine rainbow glitter that, although he didn't yet know it, he would be picking out of the toy's intricate gears for the rest of the month.

He thereby declared war on Valentine's Day and petitioned to have it banned within the House. When Quillish Wammy refused (who wanted a houseful of angry teenagers rebelling because of unfair treatment?), Near settled for simply barricading himself within his room from dusk on the 13th till dawn on the 15th.

**3**

A, as the oldest student in the House and one of the smartest, had become quite adept over the years at dancing around all of the Valentine's Day chaos. As time went on, because he was a friend to most of them and somewhat delicate as well, the younger Wammy's Kids tended to leave him out of their holiday antics.

That being the case, he was a little bit surprised when he headed to his room and found a Valentine that had been slipped underneath the door.

He bent to pick it up. It was a simple heart shape, pink with a border of red lace. The letter 'A' was neatly embossed on it in the traditional Gothic font. A smiled-someone had clearly gone to some trouble to make this-and opened it.

And then it exploded.

**3**

Yes, Valentine's Day was always a bit insane at Wammy's House. But it was, the older ones decided, just another part of the grand experience.

Exploding cards and all.

**3Fin**

**A/N: VDay crack, anyone? XD Extra thanks to Moony-san; the Marshmello nickname is all her!**

**Say…do you guys have any thoughts on future chapters? Anything you'd really like to see?**


	39. Connection

I don't own Death Note or any of the quotes I use at the start of a drabble. Not being sued would make my day! ^_^

**A/N: TYVM Walking-on-the-Promenade, mangaluver34, Lan, Eliza, DeathFruitsMaximumSecrets, Lighthouse Tail, Tails-Coyote-Carnivore and Rizera!**

**Lan****-san: Thanks so much for the compliment! I'll keep the Near/B idea in mind; it sounds cool. Unfortunately I can't use your ideas concerning the Shinigami, the leftover notebooks etc., because these drabbles are supposed to center around Wammy's Kids. Sorry. ^^;**

**Connection**

**][**

"_You can trust me-trust nobody." –The Fray_

**][**

Looking back, it had happened so fast.

It had started when one of the others, reading the newspaper, had shot out of his seat with an exclaimed "L just zeroed in on Kira's location!"

The yell prompted a buzz of conversation and a scramble as everyone within earshot bolted to take a look at the article and ask questions.

"Where was it?" one kid yelled.

"Japan," was the reply. "Region's unspecified, not that I blame them…"

"Japan," one of the girls standing near Linda said triumphantly. "I told you, Kenzie, now pay up."

Linda patiently made her way to the boy holding the paper. Her eyes were scanning the article to find out what method L had used to narrow down the field, when an all too familiar name caught her eye.

'…_Lind L. Tailor, a criminal on death row, was used as bait to draw out Kira. Masquerading as the detective L on live television, Tailor called Kira 'evil' and swore to capture him. He was killed by a heart attack minutes later._

_While this tactic has drawn protests from people who believe it is wrong to trade a human life, even that of a criminal, for information on Kira, most agree that…'_

Linda stopped reading and backed away, slowly. Once freed from the tangles of the little crowd, she bolted to the nearest bathroom and threw up.

Kneeling on the cold floor, her mind replayed what the scene must have looked like, over and over. A live television broadcast, played only in a specified area. A strong voice denouncing Kira as an evil murderer who must be caught. A pale face with slim eyes, framed by dark hair, always serious and calm.

And then the face morphed, twisting into an agonized expression as the skin of it started shifting from one color to another. The contents of Linda's stomach forcefully rose up again.

_Lind L Tailor._ The name repeated itself in her head, which was pounding. _Lind L Tailor._

_Lind._

She started to shake.

_Lind._

_Brother._

**][Fin**


	40. Normality

Disclaimer: I am neither Tsugumi Ohba or Takeshi Obata; argal, Death Note is not mine.

**A/N: TYVM mangaluver34, Applewhite, FrayedPages, Tails-Coyote-Carnivore and Lan! 40 chaps-thank you all so much for helping keep this thing going so long!**

**Yes, I suck. My updating frequency (still) fails epically. This has been well established, and I apologize.**

**Normality**

"_In ordinary life, the consequence is real." –Sum 41_

Normality was what she wanted after leaving Wammy's. Normality and a good, healthy dose of boring.

And no place did boring better than high school.

That was what Linda had always heard, anyway. Or read. Read, most likely.

But school was step three of her immersion into regular life. Step one had been leaving the House, obviously, because the word 'normal' in the way most people thought of it didn't even begin to apply there. Step two had been switching countries, because there was no way she could immerse herself in the typical status quo when every street and sight held a memory from her other life.

Japan had seemed as good a place as any to go.

The next step had been picking a high school, because that was where _normal_ kids her age spent their days. The closest one to her apartment had been the one she chose, as she wasn't willing to buy a car or a bike and the bus sounded less than appealing (House living had instilled a slight neat-freakiness in most of its inhabitants, and Linda was no exception).

The night before her first day of real school, she had stayed up all night gleefully constructing a fake past and life. She made it as boring as possible, to contrast sharply with the truth, and committed it to memory. The prospect of being treated just like any other kid was almost too exciting to stand.

Morning came and with it the new and improved (never mind the paradoxical nature of that statement) "Lin Walker". 'Lin' because all 'Linda' would ever do was remind her of the House (while at the same time she didn't think she could get used to another name entirely), and 'Walker' simply because it sounded normal but not _glaringly_ so like, say, Smith.

She tried to do half her best on schoolwork, to maintain a decent grade as opposed to a spectacular one. She answered incorrectly on purpose. Once in a while she'd say smart-alecky things to her teacher, and delight in the resulting scolding.

She was just one more kid attending high school. She could not have been happier.

Besides, even if Linda had used more of her actual potential, it seemed that she still might have had competition. As time passed she noticed that one boy always got top marks, no matter the class. In gossipy whispers she heard him referred to as 'the prodigy' and 'the hottie', depending on what type of crowd was doing the whispering.

She introduced herself to him after being at the school a week. (Step four: Make friends.)

"Lin Walker."

He'd smiled in what seemed to be a nice, if distant way. "Light Yagami. Nice to meet you."

"You as well," she replied in perfect Japanese. "I hope we can be friends."

He smiled again.

It wasn't to be, though. Less than two days later she noticed him leave school with a thin, ratty black notebook tucked between his regular schoolbooks. Some vague gut feeling made her shiver.

She didn't speak to him again. Genius or no, gut feelings were things to be followed, more often than not. And that was one Wammy's lesson she still valued.

**-Fin**

**A/N: I may delve some more into the whole Linda-having-run-ins-with-Light plotline.**

**Hope you liked. Hope someone's still actually reading this. ^^;**


	41. Anarchy

Disclaimer: I do not own Death Note or any characters therein.

**A/N: TYVM to Catalog Cats, Rizera, Nehan Shinzui34, shirayuki-zephyr, OhMyGeePinkSucksAss, Lan, Ryuks-Poizun-Applez, TheIcecreamAlchemist, Ninna-chan, Psycho17, sunshineonacloudyday and scrambled-eggs-at-midnight!**

**And thank you everyone who's read this, reviewed, Favorited, put on alert—whatever. I really appreciate the support of this very bizarre story of mine.**

**That being said, this is the last chapter. Sorry about the abruptness, but, well…this hasn't been updated in nearly a year. It's probably not too shocking. ^^;**

**Anarchy**

**(-)**

"_How do you do, I_

_See you've met my_

_Faithful handyman."_

_-Dr. Frank-N-Furter_

**(-)**

Everything had been decided. Near was taking over as the world's new L, and despite the fact that none of them had ever been in this sort of position before, it seemed an unwritten rule that every L must have his Watari. Roger was the one most suitable to take over the position.

It wasn't unexpected. Roger had been training his own successor for years, ever since Mello took off with no intention of coming back. The old caretaker had had a feeling then that this day would come, so he wasn't surprised when it finally did.

It was a strange, surreal feeling, packing his things to leave his home of over three decades. He'd seen this House built. He'd seen the child who would one day be vaunted as the world's greatest detective ushered through its doors, silent and scared. He'd seen the triumphs of his old friend Wammy through the orphanage, and he'd witnessed the bitter failures.

He'd treated more colds and flus than he could remember, been hit with more water balloons and pieces of chalk than he could count, been victim to an endless number of excessively elaborate pranks devised by bored young genii.

While he would never go so far as to say he loved the Wammy's Children—and no matter what, they were and would always be Wammy's children—it would be a lie to say he didn't care for them. And the House itself, well…that, he did love. He loved what it stood for and the possibilities that it offered.

Up until now it had been his responsibility to make sure those possibilities were fulfilled to the best of his abilities. Now, however, that duty would fall at last to someone else.

Roger closed his suitcase, picked it up and left his room without a backward glance.

In a way, he mused, he would be doing the same job all over again—looking after a brilliant child who could take care of himself in every way except for those that mattered. And somehow he didn't doubt that Near alone would prove almost as much of a challenge as all the generations of Wammy's Children had thus far. Such was the nature of prodigies, he supposed.

As he left Wammy's House for what could be the last time, Roger took a moment to listen to the laughter coming from the grassy open space behind the building. He recalled, almost wistfully, his first days in the position of authority here. Things had probably not changed.

It was going to be anarchy in the House for a few weeks, until the new caretaker either proved himself capable of withstanding pranks and antisocial little snots or broke under the pressure and ran away screaming about evil geniuses.

Roger Ruvie chuckled to himself.

He certainly hoped his successor was up to the challenge.

**):(**

**Fin**

**):(**

**A/N: Hey, CC, if you're still reading this…you may recall a certain review in which you said:**

"_**I've always wondered what happened after the end of the manga when Roger presumably leaves Wammy's House to assist Near. Who takes over for him...?  
*blank*  
omg. TOTAL ANARCHY IN THE HOUSE!"**_

**Well, that made me laugh like an idiot and ended up inspiring this last chap, so thanks. XD**

**So that's that. Thanks again for sticking with me, and I hope you enjoyed Prodigy!**

**Over and out—SS**


End file.
